


Fix Her, Ibiki

by Sucker4TallDarkAndTerrifying



Category: Naruto
Genre: Age Difference, Canon? What Canon?, F/M, Gen, I gotta appease my daddy-issues somehow, Ibiki-centric, The Grumpy One is Soft For the Sunshine One, and ibiki has the soul of an old man anyway, and there is no way he's 28 nope no way i refuse, if you think this is OOC Ibiki I want you to watch season 1 ep 25 over again, poor guy's been thru some sh-, so many smiling screenshots, the sunshine one needs some help
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:48:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 22,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26553109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sucker4TallDarkAndTerrifying/pseuds/Sucker4TallDarkAndTerrifying
Summary: "Why am I here?"“Because you know the mind better than anyone, Ibiki,” Inoichi said with a small, sad smile. “Especially the broken ones… so if there’s anybody who can put her back together, it’s you.”
Relationships: Mitarashi Anko & Original Female Character(s), Morino Ibiki/Original Female Character(s), T&I Staff & Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 52





	1. In Which Ibiki Meets His Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so, I process a lot of my ish through writing, so this is gonna be dark and rough and angsty in some spots but there's also gonna be a lot of light fluffy stuff and attempts at humor.
> 
> warnings for mental health, depression, suicidal ideation, PTSD, relationship trauma, panic attacks, after-effects of torture
> 
> *** I own none of these characters, Yūrei is a personal OC created by me ***

If there was one thing Ibiki Morino knew, it was the look of a broken human.

However, there were times he didn’t want to see it.

And this was definitely one of them.

“What are we dealing with?” he asked, his rough voice quiet as he stood across from the blonde man with a ponytail to the small of his back, the two of them outside the door to a hospital room.

Neither of them were looking at each other, both focused instead on the younger woman lying in the hospital bed, staring at the ceiling and hugging a stuffed dog to her chest.

“Actually, if I didn’t know better, I’d say it looks like some of your work,” Inoichi Yamanaka answered, and to say his voice sounded somber would be an understatement.

The head of Torture and Interrogation raised an eyebrow. “Meaning?”

“Meaning her spirit and her psyche aren’t just broken, Ibiki – they’re shattered.”

“Wait a minute.” He held up a gloved hand. “A legitimate psychotic break?”

“Yes – that kid is suicidal like nobody’s business. Only before she physically acted on it, her body shut down on her, I guess as a defense mechanism, so instead of actually killing herself, she just hallucinated it a few dozen different ways for several hours this morning. Which was just great to watch by the way,” Inoichi added flatly. “She’s creative, to say the least.”

That wasn't a kid in there, but Ibiki didn't bother to correct him. “Do we know what caused it?”

“Brain chemistry is way off, according to the docs, and there’s some emotional trauma in there as well.”

Ibiki watched as she rolled to her side, facing them now, still hugging the stuffed dog to her chest, and he was glad for the two-way glass in the door as he studied her face.

“Isn’t that –”

Inoichi interrupts him: “The chunin that came over from Kiri a while back? Yes, that’s her.”

Something like five years ago now, if Ibiki remembered correctly.

She’d shown up alone at the main gates and surrendered peacefully to his ANBU, and Inoichi had gotten inside her head within the hour and found absolutely nothing to indicate any malicious intent whatsoever.

First the Demon, Zabuza Momochi, had tried unsuccessfully to stage a coup and subsequently bolted, and then barely a year later Kisame Hoshigaki had defected after attempting another, except that blue-skinned beast of a man had actually succeeded in assassinating the Land of Water’s daimyo, and at that point she’d read the writings on the wall: she’d been close with the both of them, and when Hoshigaki had left Kirigakure in an uproar with a flood of hunter-nin on his heels, she’d used the confusion to slip quietly away and seek asylum in Konoha, before Yagura could turn his depraved eyes on her next.

Even though she’d been nothing but loyal throughout her career as a kunoichi, which at the time had spanned just under ten years.

Inoichi had made a detailed report on the mind-walk and then turned her loose, and Ibiki had been made aware of the arrival, though his particular brand of services hadn’t been needed.

_What is her name?_ He couldn't think of it - she’d been off his radar for too long, and besides Izumo and Kotetsu and the select few members of his own department, he barely ever dealt with chunin.

And he had a pretty good idea of why he was standing outside the door at the present moment, though he wanted to hear it out loud.

“Why am I here?”

“Because you know the mind better than anyone, Ibiki,” Inoichi said with a small, sad smile. “Especially the broken ones… so if there’s anybody who can put her back together, it’s you.”

Exactly what he’d already guessed, but still - 

“That is a tall fucking order,” he growled. “And that is going to take time. Plus, she’s going to need therapy _and_ medications.”

And he would be going in with the assumption that a rebuild of her psyche was even _possible_ , because unfortunately, sometimes things really were just too shattered to repair, and in those cases… well, the kindest thing to do for a mad dog was to put it out of its misery.

But Ibiki was damned if he wasn’t going to at least try, and he let out a sigh. “Do we have her information?”

Inoichi handed him a file. “My notes on the mind-walk from today are in there as well. I’ll be in my office if you need me.” He touched two fingers to his hitai-ate and walked off.

Leaning one of his shoulders against the wall, Ibiki opened the file. 

On the left was her identification sheet, which had her name listed as Yūrei - _There's no way that's her birth name,_ he thought, smirking slightly- her rank of course as chunin, and her birthday in mid-December.

He did some mental math with the date and figured she was twenty-five.

Inoichi’s notes were sitting on top, on the right, and he skimmed over them, winced, shook his head, then closed the folder and tucked it under his arm, peering back into the room.

She was still laying on her side, hugging the stuffed toy, but he could tell her eyes weren’t seeing much of anything in front of them.

Ibiki turned the knob and pushed the door open, watching her reaction as he stepped inside.

She raised her head slightly at his approach, her reddened eyes travelling from the level of his belt up to his face, and he knew when she got there because she gasped softly, pulling the stuffed dog tighter to her chest as her eyes widened.

_Not the prettiest face in the village, I know._ But his voice was as gentle as he could make it as he spoke to her.

“Hello.” He gestured to the empty bed across from hers. “Do you mind?”

She shook her head mutely.

“Thanks.” He set the file down and adjusted his coat before sitting. “Feel like talking to me?”

She shrugged, but sat up to mirror his position, her legs hanging off the edge of her bed.

“My name is Ibiki Morino.”

“Nice to meet you.” Her voice was soft, and utterly despondent. “Sorry about the circumstances.”

“No need to apologize.”

Her head tilted to the side slightly as she studied him, and he knew she was taking in the grey uniform and the long black coat, trying to find a reason for him to be sitting across from her.

“You’re not a doctor,” she said finally.

“No, I’m not. I’m… well, I guess you could call me a specialist – I study the mind.”

“You’re going to have a real blast with me then,” she said, sounding exhausted as she waved a hand in the direction of her temple. “Real party up there.”

He didn’t comment on that, and instead nodded at the stuffed dog in her lap. “Can I ask?”

She frowned, looking down at it. “I actually don’t… I really don’t know why I brought him. But… I think it’s better for me to have him in my hands than… anything else.”

_I’d have to agree with you there._

Ibiki asked a question he already knew the answer to. “Do you want to hurt yourself, Yūrei?”

She just stared at him.

_Oh, yes._ She definitely did – she just didn’t have the wherewithal.

He moved on. “Do you want to hurt anyone else?”

She gave a quick and earnest shake of her head. 

That was the truth, and Ibiki was glad for it.

“Inoichi told me what happened to you this morning.” 

He stood when her shoulders hunched forward and she wrapped her arms around herself with a low whimper, and before he knew what he’d done, he’d knelt down and put a gloved hand on her knee. 

Fucking hell, why was this getting to him? 

He reduced people to this state for a living, for fuck’s sake - he was famous for it.

Maybe he was getting soft in his age. 

He’d landed on the wrong side of thirty-five this year, as Anko had been reminding him for months now.

_Or maybe it’s those eyes,_ Ibiki thought, as they met his once again. 

Those impossibly blue eyes, filled with tears that for once, he hadn’t caused. 

There was _pain,_ so much pain, and beneath that she was begging, pleading for it to stop.

And beneath _that_ … well, “kill me, please” didn’t always have to be verbal to be conveyed.

Not to Ibiki anyway.

“Listen to me,” he said as he looked up at her. “You’re going to be okay.”

She shook her head, and the tears spilled out as she closed her eyes.

_Fuck._

He’d read enough of Inoichi’s notes, and he knew what she needed.

Ibiki stood back up and moved to the door, looking into the hall. 

Nobody to the left.

Nobody to the right.

He pulled the door closed.

Was he really going to do this?

Fuck him, but yes, yes he was.

He stepped back to the bed.

She looked up at him, and he reached forward with his gloved hands, gently brushing her tears away with his thumbs, before abruptly pulling her into a hug.

Her body stiffened in surprise, but after only the briefest of hesitations he felt her slide her arms around his waist beneath his coat, and her face pressed harder against his chest as she let out another whimper.

“It’s alright,” he said softly.

Three syllables.

Three syllables and she broke down immediately and completely, her body wracked by the intensity of her sobs.

_Fuck…._ He didn’t particularly like the protective emotions stirring in his chest, but he ignored them for the moment, shoving them in a mental box to be analyzed later.

“You’re going to be okay….” He lowered his head, resting his scarred chin against her hair.

Her scent reminded him of an ocean breeze, and he kept murmuring to her as his right hand rubbed up and down her spine.

Ibiki didn’t know how long he held her, only that he wasn’t letting go until she was finished, and several minutes later he realized that she had in fact quieted down, her arms around him only loosely, though she was making no attempt to break the contact as she rested her forehead against his chest.

“Feel better?” he asked.

“… I got your shirt all wet,” she mumbled.

“I can get another.” 

She said something too quiet to understand.

“What was that?” He brought his head down to hear her better.

“… You smell nice.”

He chuckled and stepped back, brushing her hair out of her face and taking her chin gently between his thumb and index finger.

“Keep this up, alright? I’ll be back to talk to you some more soon,” he said.

She smiled shyly, dropping her eyes to his chest, and then nodded as he let go.

_Well, look at that – progress already._

He turned, grabbing the file and glancing around the room.

Ibiki found what he was looking for in the top corner closest to the door. 

_Right._ Before he went anywhere, he was getting his hands on that tape.

Just because _he_ knew he’d gone soft didn’t mean the entire fucking village had to.

**********

Two hours later, he was sitting at his desk with the tape locked in a drawer and Inoichi sitting across from him, the blonde man’s eyebrows raised in surprise.

“Are you kidding? _Here_?”

Ibiki sighed. “Look, you were in her head. The first two lines of your notes label her as suicidal, psychotic, and a flight risk. And you know how lax the security is at the hospital - the only reason she’s still breathing right now is because her room locks from the outside and there aren’t any windows in it.

“She didn’t have any active thoughts of self-harm during the mind-walk.”

“And do you honestly think it’s going to stay that way if she’s locked in that room for days on end? We want recovery, not more mental torture. …In this case, anyway.” He pulled a sheet of paper from the file in front of him. “She lives alone, with a cat. Who brought her in to the hospital?”

“She admitted herself.”

“Doesn’t sound like there’s much of a support system there to me then. What do you think?”

“I think I’m inclined to agree with you.”

“And the easiest way to monitor her is to keep her here. I’m here damn near twelve hours every day, and there’s someone in intake twenty-four seven. We can outfit room One, since it’s the biggest. Everything dangerous is locked up already – she can have free roam of my entire department at least, if she wants.”

“You think she’ll agree to it?”

“She doesn’t have a choice.”

“True. What about the cat?”

Ibiki shrugged. “I’ll feed it.”

“Alright…” The blonde shinobi nodded, pushing his chair back as he stood, and touched two fingers to his headband before leaving.

Ibiki reached for the phone on his desk, dialing the extension for the Hokage’s office.

It was answered immediately.

He relayed his plan succinctly, asked for Kotetsu and Izumo to help with setting up the room, thanked the Hokage when his actions were approved without question, and hung up.

The warm feeling spreading in his chest was _not_ because he was about to see Yūrei again, he told himself.

Really, it wasn’t.


	2. We Take Care of Our Own

Ibiki kept his distance this time, his hands in his pockets as he explained the terms of the release from the hospital to Yūrei. 

He was careful to avoid the actual name of the T&I department and instead referred to the building housing it by the name she would already know: the Intelligence Division. 

She seemed interested, sitting up in bed with her legs over the side, the same position she’d taken a few hours ago when he’d spoken to her.

“– until you’re deemed suitably recovered to return home,” he finished. 

Her eyebrows rose slightly. “And who decides that?”

“I do.”

“…Alright,” she said after a moment. “Can I get some stuff from my house?”

“Of course, but I’ll have to go with you.”

_She can’t hide her emotions worth a damn._

In the seconds before she’d answered him, he’d seen her panic, weigh options, have a flash of anger, and become resigned.

Which he was translating as an “oh fuck” moment because she’d realized she couldn’t bullshit him, then considered the fact that it could have been Inoichi, and then she would have been in _real_ trouble, followed by anger because she then realized it was most likely going to be a good bit before she was deemed well enough, and she’d accepted defeat.

She slipped forward off the bed and onto her feet, grabbing the stuffed dog by its neck.

Ibiki had to stop himself from grinning as she approached. 

It was just that she was a full foot shorter than him - the top of her head wouldn’t even reach his shoulders.

“I don’t have anything else in here,” she said, looking around the room. “My identification and stuff are at the nurse’s station, I think.”

“That’s fine. We can get them on the way out.” He glanced down at her bare feet. “No shoes?”

She looked down. “Ah, fuck.” 

Then her head snapped up and she winced. “Sorry.”

He shrugged. “I’ve heard worse.” _Said worse, too._

Studying her, he noted that while her long-sleeved black undershirt and pants were baggy on her and hid the finer details of her frame, she appeared to be curvy, but built a bit stockier than the average female, with a long torso and shoulders just a touch too broad. 

If he had to guess, she would be just the right mix of muscle and softness.

He pushed the door open and held it for her after she’d pulled her sandals on, and he bit the inside of his cheek to stop himself once more from smiling at the difference in their height as she ducked past him into the hall.

It was worrisome, actually, how she was affecting him. 

Ibiki had avoided any relationships of a deeper nature as a general rule, but especially after he’d been tortured.

The less anyone had over him, the better – loved ones were leverage.

And right now he was acutely aware that he felt like an idiotic teenager with a crush, on a kunoichi eleven years younger than him no less, that he’d met barely a handful of hours ago.

With a mind that was currently in the same shape as someone he might have worked over with a few of his more brutal psychological torture methods. 

Yeah. He was definitely in trouble.

_Fuck._

**********

They walked up to her front door, and she pulled the key from her pocket, then hesitated.

“Something wrong?” he asked.

Yūrei ducked her head in what he could see was embarrassment. “It’s just… it’s messy.”

“I won’t judge.” 

And Ibiki wouldn’t. His house had certainly seen its share of his bad days, and suffered from it.

She unlocked the door and stepped in, and he followed a few steps behind.

It wasn’t that bad, actually. 

Sure, there were some take-out boxes scattered around, and the laundry had piled up a bit, but he’d subjected his own place to much worse before.

A high-pitched cry got his attention, and a thump across the room announced the presence of the cat as it jumped down from a shelf, continuing to meow.

Except then it caught sight of him and fled instantly, a streak of mostly-brown mottled color that disappeared into the bathroom.

 _Strange._ Usually animals loved him.

He shrugged it off, sliding his hands into his pockets and leaning against the refrigerator as he turned his eyes back to the woman in front of him.

She had tossed the stuffed dog onto her bed on the floor, but was currently standing frozen and staring at the nightstand with her back to him.

He looked past her and saw a pair of eyeglasses – 

With a kunai beside them.

Ibiki straightened and measured the distance instantly – twelve feet between him and Yūrei.

Four feet between her and the knife.

_Don’t you fucking dare._

He pulled his hands from his pockets and brought them to the level of his chest, bending his knees slightly in preparation to spring toward her.

She turned to the right, towards her dresser.

_Good girl._

But he waited for her commit to the decision and actually pull a drawer open before he crossed the room and picked the knife up, spinning it around his index finger.

“Yūrei.”

She flinched at the sound of his voice. “I’m not – I wasn’t going to.”

“I need you to stay still, and I need you to tell me where the rest of your weapons are, right now.” 

Because she’d started with the present tense when referencing hurting herself, and that was bad enough, but what was worse? He couldn’t see her hands.

Ibiki pocketed the kunai and took a step toward her. “Don’t move, Yūrei.” 

“Fuck this.” She straightened angrily.

She was flat on her face in less than a second with his knee between her shoulder blades, his left hand on the back of her head, and his right hand pinning her wrist to the floor.

He was disappointed, but not surprised. 

“I told you not to move,” he growled down at her.

“S-sorry,” she choked, voice muffled.

Ibiki let up slightly on the pressure with his knee, and she dragged in a breath.

He took his hand off her head. “I’m going to let go of your wrist next, and when I do, I want you to put your hands on your head.”

“My left arm is pinned under me.”

Ibiki knew that already, but he’d wanted to see what she would do. 

Raising his knee only a fraction more, he let her wriggle the limb out from under her body before he reapplied the pressure.

Fuck, she was so much _smaller_ than him.

“Hands. Head. Now.” He let go of her wrist.

She laced her fingers together and settled them across the back of her head beneath her ponytail, her forehead resting against the floor.

He brought his hands into a sign, and a shadow clone came into existence in front of him.

“Okay,” he said, and shifted his position so that he had a knee on the floor on either side of her before settling his weight on his haunches. He now had her effectively trapped, but no longer pinned by his weight. “Now tell me exactly what it is you want to bring with you.”

Yūrei rattled off a short list, and he had the clone collect everything and stuff it into a pack that had been found in the closet. 

Suddenly there was another choking sound beneath him, and Ibiki looked down and saw that she was trembling. And as he listened, her breathing pattern changed abruptly, shallowing out before hitching in her chest.

She was having a panic attack.

 _Fuck._ He got up immediately, then reached down and grabbed her by the biceps, pulling her off the floor and standing her up to face him.

“Yūrei.” He put his hands on either of her face and tipped her head up. “Yūrei, look at me.” 

Her hands went to his wrists and gripped tightly, and her blue eyes were wide and wild as she held his gaze, her breath catching in her throat as she started to hyperventilate.

“Hey, hey – you’re okay. You’re okay, Yūrei. Just breathe in through your nose. Through your _nose._ Good. Deep breaths. In through your nose, and out through your mouth. Yes, just like that. Keep going. Good job.”

Her breathing stabilized over the next thirty seconds or so, her grip on his wrists loosening slightly.

“Do you know where you are?” he asked, looking at her carefully.

“H-home?”

“Yes, that’s right. Do you know _who_ you are?”

“Y-y-Yūrei.”

“Right again. And do you know who I am?”

“Ib-b-bik-ki.”

She was shaking like a leaf in the wind, and he saw her eyes fill up with tears again.

 _Ah, hell._ Ibiki stepped closer and pulled her against him.

Her arms shot around him and squeezed, and he coughed, surprised at the amount of strength in her little body, and because she’d taken him, only slightly, off guard by responding that quickly. 

Her face nuzzled against his chest, and he curled his left arm around her the top of her shoulders as his right hand stroked up and down her spine.

Yūrei whimpered something into his shirt.

“Hm?” He lowered his head, and she stuttered for a moment trying to repeat herself until he just tightened his grip and hushed her with soothing words spoken softly in his rough voice, until she stopped trembling.

**********

Yūrei stopped dead in her tracks, looking from Ibiki to the sign and back.

“I thought you said you _studied_ the mind.”

Ibiki had been prepared for a variety of reactions once she’d seen the sign above the door to his department.

Rank and abject terror, however, had not been one of them.

And it was emanating from her in waves.

She even took a step back, and although he knew it was unintentional, knew it was only the result of her fight-or-flight instinct kicking in – _With a strong predisposition to flight, apparently_ – he reached over and gently gripped her elbow.

“I do. I know exactly how it works, and that knowledge comes in handy when you need to find out something that someone else doesn’t want you to know, or you need to break something in them. In your case, however, we want to build you back up, and knowing the mind like I do is what’s going to help me to help you.”

He moved around to stand in front of her. 

“This is simply the easiest and best place for us to keep an eye on you to make sure you stay safe.”

She still looked apprehensive. “Promise?”

“I promise.”

The terror abated, but she stayed closer to him than his shadow as they were buzzed into the main area of T&I and he introduced her to the chunin at the desk, Tonbo, and showed her how to navigate the department, which was mostly pointing out where the kitchen, bathrooms and showers, and his office were.

He explained that all the doors in the department had two-way glass, and showed her how it appeared to be a mirror on the inside of the room, whereas someone standing on outside would instead be able to look directly in.

He also explained how all the rooms for “guests” had sealing and privacy jutsu on them, which not only suppressed the chakra of anyone inside, but also made them almost completely sound-proof.

“Because of the screaming?” she asked quietly.

“Only one of the reasons.” He pulled the door open to room One and gestured for her to step inside. “This is where you’ll be staying.”

“Why do I feel like none of the other rooms have beds this nice,” she said with a wry smile, dropping her pack on the comforter and turning to look at him. “Do they even have beds at all?”

It was a fantastic double bed – Izumo and Kotetsu had done well. He’d have to buy them lunch tomorrow.

“Most don’t,” he answered, “but some do. In a manner of speaking, anyway. You’re right though, none of them are this nice.”

He might be buying the two chunin lunch for a few days, actually.

“Why don’t you try it out?” he suggested. “You look exhausted.”

She climbed up on the bed and stretched out on her side, looking over at him shyly. 

“You really brought this here just for me?” Her voice was soft, and color was creeping into her cheeks.

“Well, we certainly weren’t expecting you to sleep on the floor.” He smiled at her. “I have some work to catch up on, but I’ll come by again to talk to you before I leave.”

Yūrei nodded and pulled her pillow into a more comfortable position, cuddling it and resting her head on it at the same time, then closed her eyes.

Ibiki stepped out of the room and closed the door behind him before turning to Tonbo and relaying the situation as briefly as he could.

The chunin nodded. “Standard suicidal subject operating procedures of fifteen-minute checks, got it.”

“Closed door checks are fine as long as she looks okay, and belay checks if she’s with me. She will be allowed to leave the room, but she is confined this department only. I’ll write up specific protocol for her for you to pass along to whoever is coming to relieve you.”

“Roger that, sir.”

**********

Ibiki leaned back and rubbed his eyes when the words on the report he was reading started to blur.

Glancing at the clock, he saw that it was almost six in the evening, and his stomach growled as though it had been waiting only for him to notice the time to make its needs known.

He stood up from his desk and reached for the ceiling with his long arms, the stiff muscles in his back protesting as he stretched after sitting in the same position for hours on end.

Leaving his office, he headed to the kitchen and grabbed two bento boxes, two pairs of chopsticks, and two bottles of water, holding the boxes and utensils in one hand with the bottles tucked between his chest and his arm while he moved down the hallway into the main area.

Ibiki glanced into room One and saw Yūrei laying on her back and staring at the ceiling with a hand behind her head and the other across her ribs, so he didn’t bother knocking before he pulled the door open – not that she could hear anything outside the door with the privacy jutsu in place anyway.

“Easy now girlie, it’s just me,” he said when she sat up quickly with wide eyes. “I brought dinner.”

Her gaze dropped to the boxes in his hand. “Thank you, but I’m not really hungry.”

_Too bad._ He walked forward and sat on the end of the bed. “When was the last time you ate?”

She frowned, thinking. “… Day before yesterday, maybe? I don’t know. I just haven’t wanted food.”

“You need to eat anyway. Your body fuels your brain, Yūrei.” He put a bento box and one of the water bottles in her lap, then reached forward and gently tapped the top of her head with the chopsticks. “Unhappy body means unhappy mind.”

He waited for an argument, but she just picked up what he’d given her and shifted to a cross-legged position with her back against her pillows before she finally opened the box.

“So,” he said after they’d taken a few bites in silence, “I’d imagine this morning was pretty unpleasant for you.”

“To say the least,” she whispered.

He nodded in understanding. “Do you want to fill me in on what you think might have pushed you to that point?”

“Too much.” She’d been bringing the water bottle to her lips, but she lowered it slowly and shook her head. “Too much, too fast.”

He waited for her to elaborate. He’d already gotten most of what he’d needed from the report of the mind-walk, but he mostly wanted to get her talking, because his instincts were telling him she had the same bad habit he did of bottling things up.

She reached up to rub the back of her neck, not meeting his gaze. “I feel like my whole life just… flipped, and my brain -” She snapped her fingers beside her temple.

That had essentially been _exactly_ what happened - almost every single aspect of her life had suddenly been flipped around on her, and she’d been able to deal with it for a few weeks, until her brain had just snapped and taken her for a ride.

“Talk to me?” he offered softly. “I mean hell, I don’t know about Kiri, but in Konoha we shinobi take care of our own. Meaning if you want to talk, I’m all ears, and if you want I break this fucking civilian’s legs, then you got that too, girlie.”

He meant it, too.

She blushed, shaking her head shyly. “No, you don’t have to do that.”

And after a moment, she started talking again:

_Woman meets man, they begin a relationship. Relationship goes well. So well, in fact, that soon she’s sleeping in his bed almost every night even though she has an apartment of her own. They even discuss marriage a few times. But before they do that, they move into a proper house together._

_At this point they’re two years in._

_She is dealing with anxiety and depression, has been for almost ten years now, but lately it’s getting worse, so much worse, but she’s trying. She’s trying so fucking hard, but the whispers are in her head and they won’t go away, and all she thinks about is death – hers._

_But she doesn’t want to die, not really, because life is objectively pretty great, right? She’s got a good job, she’s sharing a home with the love of her life, and she should be happy, right?_

_So why can’t she stop? Why aren’t her medications working anymore?_

_And then, only three months after they move in together, he comes from absolutely fucking nowhere and tells her that he is no longer happy, no longer in love with her, and that she needs to find her own place to live._

_She begs him to try, tells him she can do better, she will do better._

_He says no._

_She asks him if there is someone else._

_He says no._

_There is no more discussion – he will not change his mind, and within the week she is on her own again, in a completely new and different apartment across the village._

_Two days pass and it turns out he lied, and has in fact been seeing several women for quite a while, one of whom approaches her in attempt to discover if he is lying to her as well._

“And you’re sure you don’t want me to pay this guy a visit?” Ibiki asked through clenched teeth, keeping the lid on his KI screwed down tightly because pure homicidal fury would not the best thing for her to be exposed to right now in her recovery process.

“I’m sure.”

“Even if I swear to just talk to him?” he asked hopefully. He did his best work without laying a hand on people, after all, but she doesn’t know that.

“Something tells me that might be worse?” Her giggle sounded nervous.

 _Damn, she’d figured him out._ He smiled reassuringly at her as he closed his empty bento box and stood up from the bed.

“Nothing that you don’t want me to do, girlie,” he said. “Finish your dinner, alright? I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She nodded and started eating again, and he left the room.


	3. More Than He'd Bargained For

Ibiki stopped at the hospital on the way to T&I the next morning to pick up the medications Yūrei had been prescribed: anti-depressants and anti-psychotics.

He noticed the former were the same kind he took himself, but the dosage on the bottle surprised him.

_Her brain chemistry must be fucked seven ways to Sunday, if it’s that high._

The pills rattled in the pocket of his coat as he strode into his department at ten minutes past six in the morning, after being buzzed in through the heavy metal entrance door.

“Status report,” he barked at the chunin behind the desk, Mozuku.

“Morning, sir. Everything secure with no changes. I relieved Shinobu about ten minutes ago and was about to make my first round of condition checks before handing out breakfasts to those getting them.”

Ibiki nodded. “Put a tray to the side for Yūrei. If she’s not up by eight, wake her up and give it to her.”

“Yes, sir.”

**********

At eight thirty, Ibiki stood up from his desk and made his way to room One.

Yūrei was awake, again laying on her back in bed and staring at the ceiling, hugging one of her two pillows to her chest.

He pulled the door open, and she sat up when she saw him step in.

“Morning,” he said as he closed the door behind him. “How did you sleep?”

“Not well,” she said with a shrug. “But I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in months, so that’s not exactly new.”

“That’s unfortunate.” He pulled the two bottles of pills from his pocket. “These are for you.”

“Happy pills,” she said sardonically. “Bring ‘em on.”

Ibiki was used to people being flippant as a defense mechanism, so he only popped the top of the bottles, shook a single pill from each into his gloved hand, and passed them to her.

“There are drinks in the kitchen if you need something to take those with.”

“Sure.” She slipped off the bed and stuck the pills in her pocket.

He opened the door and let her step out of the room first, then walked beside her to the kitchen.

Mozuku was setting the coffee pot back on the burner when they entered. 

“Hey there,” he said. “I just made a fresh pot, if you’re a coffee drinker.” 

And as the bespectacled chunin smiled warmly down at her, Ibiki had a sudden thought of snapping the younger man’s neck.

Yūrei nodded, and grinned shyly as he passed her a mug. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.” Mozuku raised his own mug to her and went back to the desk.

Ibiki leaned back against the counter with his arms folded, watching as she busied herself with coffee and sugar and creamer, and he waited until she’d finished to speak.

“Yūrei.”

“Yeah?”

“Medicine.”

“Oh, right.” She put a hand in her pocket and pulled out the pills, tossing them into her mouth and taking a sip of coffee immediately after. 

_Good girl._

“So how do we fix… this?” she asked, waving a hand near her temple.

“Well, the medications will help, but they’re going to take some time to start working. In the meantime, I have some ideas.”

**********

Ibiki met with her in his office or in her room a minimum of three times daily: immediately after he arrived at work around six, though only for a few minutes, just so that she could take her medicine and go back to sleep, then again in the mid-afternoon, and right before he left for the evening.

The first time he’d met with her, he’d pulled off his bandana with his hitai-ate. 

She’d given him her story, so he would return the favor, because they needed to establish a foundation of trust before he attempted to get further into her shattered mind.

He was mildly surprised at her reaction – she looked sad rather than revolted, but after a moment her face grew troubled, followed by anger that he could see was directed at herself.

“What’s wrong?”

She gestured to her head, looking disgusted. “I’m falling the fuck apart over a stupid break-up, and you’ve obviously been through so much worse.”

He shrugged. “Like you said: your entire life changed in a matter of days. And you’d already been fighting mental battles. Pain is one thing, but putting that much strain on someone’s mind – well, that can be even more effective in breaking someone than just making them bleed.”

It was the reason Ibiki was the best, and it was the reason Yūrei was currently his responsibility.

He also made sure his chunin interacted with her, and was immensely pleased to see that Mozuku, Shimon, and Tonbo all seemed to genuinely like her after a couple of days, and from then on he made sure to praise them when they made extra efforts to keep her from isolating whenever they worked the desk.

**********

On day four, Anko returned from a mission, and as she strolled into Ibiki’s office to turn in the report she stopped in her tracks at the sight of Yūrei sitting cross-legged on his couch. 

Once Ibiki explained the situation, however, the purple-haired kunoichi promptly announced that Yūrei was going to be her new best friend, showing back up an hour later with a box full of dango and dragging the smaller woman back to room One, closing the door behind them.

Ibiki had huffed at her dramatic nature, but in actuality was glad for the result, because while Yūrei was building a crucial support system with him and his three chunin, she would still need the company and friendship of another woman her own age, and while Anko might be a handful, she was fiercely protective.

**********

The next morning though, Ibiki knew something was wrong the moment he walked into his department. 

Mozuku and Shinobu both looked unsettled as they sat behind the big desk in the center of the floor.

And the air wasn’t right, somehow. The atmosphere in the room was off. There was something… yes, there it was. Pulsing. Subtle, but it was there, and he focused on it, feeling it in his chest. 

It didn’t seem to have a set cadence.

It was annoying.

“What the _fuck_ is going on in here?” he barked.

The two chunin at the desk looked at each other, at him, and then down at the desk in front of them.

Fucking hell, they were _fidgeting._

“If one of you doesn’t give me something in the next ten seconds, I’m locking _both_ of you in Five with Anko for the next eight hours,” he hissed.

“It’s Yūrei,” Mozuku said immediately. “But, uh – you’re gonna need earplugs before you check it out.”

_What the fuck?_ “Did you say earplugs?”

“Yeah.”

Ibiki stalked toward the desk, put his palms down slightly more than shoulder-width apart, and leaned in toward the two men.

He knew his stature was impressive, that his broad and heavily muscled shoulders and chest cut an imposing figure, and that the long black coat he wore with its tall collar only served to enhance the overall image. 

As such, his current posturing was something he used often in his interrogations.

And sure enough, both chunin cringed away from him.

Ibiki’s voice was deceptively soft. “What did you do?”

“She-asked-if-she-could-bring-the-boombox-in-the-kitchen-back-to-her-room-because-it-was-too-quiet-and-I-said-sure-because-it-runs-on-batteries-so-there’s-no-cord-you-know-and-I-figured-it-was-safe-but-I-didn’t-know-Anko’s-tapes-were-in-there-and-I’m-sorry-oh-God-I’m-so-sorry-Ibiki-please-don’t-kill-me.” 

Mozuku took a breath and continued cowering in the older man’s shadow.

“She also hasn’t slept in over twenty-four hours,” Shinobu added. “But we have no idea why not.”

Ibiki dropped his head, sighed deeply, and then turned toward room One.

_This is going to be a long morning._

He grabbed the handle and pulled the door open.

Immediately the intake room was filled with the cacophony of sounds accompanied by screaming that Anko called “music”, and the two chunin slapped their hands over their ears.

He stepped inside and pulled the door closed behind him.

Yūrei was sitting upright in bed with her legs crossed, her back to the headboard. There was a stack of empty file folders on her knee that she was using as a makeshift table, and she was scribbling away at a sheet of paper, a small stack of filled in pages on the bed in front of her.

Her head was nodding aggressively to the beat of the…whatever it was, and she was mouthing the words perfectly in sync with the shouting on the tape.

Which meant she’d been doing this for hours, if she knew them by heart now.

She hadn’t noticed him open the door, enter the room, or shut the door behind him – the music was that loud, and she was engrossed in whatever she was doing.

But then she paused in her writing, tapping the pen against her chin, and looked up to stare into the space ahead of her.

It was comical, really, what happened next.

Yūrei caught sight of him and jumped so badly the file folders and every sheet of paper on the bedspread went flying, and she immediately reached over to the boombox and cranked the volume all the way down to OFF.

“Ibiki!” she exclaimed joyfully, _loudly,_ and scrambled off the bed.

_Well that’s a far cry from the usual greet –_

Her bare foot landed on a stray sheet of paper and went out from under her immediately, and he leapt forward, managing to kneel and catch her by the arm before she busted her ass on the stone floor.

She surprised him even further by throwing the arm he wasn’t holding her up with around him in a tight hug, and shoving her face into his neck with a happy squeal.

Fuck, she was almost _literally_ vibrating with energy.

He let go of her arm, because she was steady enough hanging off his shoulders and neck, and grunted, “Your peripheral vision is horrible,” because that was what he had thought immediately upon entering the room and getting no notice from her.

She let go of him and pulled her face out of his collar to settle back into a cross-legged position on the floor, and that was when he got his first decent and up-close look at her for the day, staring into her too-bright blue eyes that were squinting slightly and just a little out of focus.

She was _heavily _into mania from sleep deprivation, alright.__

____

“They told me that in the Academy,” she said with a shrug, and chattered on. “Said it would be a big handicap in fights because when our adrenaline spikes it gives us tunnel vision, so I would be pretty much blind. But I do all my best work close up anyway.” 

____

He could hear the tremble in her voice that belied her exhaustion, even though she was churning out words a mile a minute. 

____

“I have so much fucking _energy_ it is un _real_ ,” she said. “I feel like I could just run and run and run and run and _run,_ and _nobody_ could catch me.” 

____

She flashed him a wide grin. 

____

“I could catch you,” he answered, grinning back at her because his back was to the door. 

____

“Nuh-uh.” She shook her head. “Nope, not the way I’m feeling right now.” 

____

“Oh, I’m pretty sure I could.” He reached up and rubbed his thumb over the scar on his lip like he was thinking about it. “I’d catch you in… five minutes, tops.” 

____

He didn’t know how fast she was, and he knew he would be at a disadvantage hauling his two-hundred-and change-pounds of muscle after her, but he was still sure that he could catch her, even if it took longer than five minutes, for two reasons: 

____

One: she wasn’t in peak form and would inevitably wear herself out, and that’s when he would pounce. 

____

Two: he knew that subconsciously, she would _want_ him to catch her. 

____

So he was playing along for the moment because even if she didn’t remember this conversation when the mania inevitably ended and she crashed, her body would remember the flood adrenaline and endorphins, and that would help her continue to recover. 

____

“Bet.” She stuck her hand out, a determined glint in her eye. 

____

“Hm?”

____

“Bet on it. Unless you’re scared to lose?” 

____

That was _definitely_ the mania talking, because she’d clearly forgotten that not only she was confined to the department, she had obviously lost all her social inhibition when it came to him, at least for the moment. 

____

He considered the possibilities for a moment. _… Fuck it, let’s take a field trip._

____

Reaching forward, he grabbed her hand. “You’re on, girlie. Terms?” 

____

She laughed out loud. “I honestly didn’t think I would get this far.” 

____

Ibiki just shook his head with a smile. “I suppose it will just have to be the satisfaction of winning, then.” 

____

“Wait-wait- _wait_.” She looked at him more closely. “Are we really going to do this?” 

____

He shrugged. They would run around, she would tire herself out, and then he’d shunshin her back so that she could get some sleep and he could get some work done. “Sure, why not?” 

____

Yūrei uncrossed her legs and jumped up, and thankfully neither of her feet landed on any of the stray sheets of paper that were littering the floor. 

____

“I’ll just clean all this up and get my shoes on, and we can go?” She looked at him hopefully. 

____

“Yes. What are you writing?” he asked. 

____

“Just journaling,” she answered quickly. “It used to help me get all the… noise, I guess, out of my head usually, so I figured I’d give it a shot again.” 

____

Ibiki had a similar approach to writing his reports, actually. 

____

Transcribing them to the page helped them flow more easily from his mind, and shoving the completed ones in a filing cabinet helped him even further to forget. 

____

“It will. Just come to my office when you’re ready to leave.” 

____

He stood up and backed toward the door, careful not to step on any of the pages. 

____

********** 

____

Ibiki had gone over the ground rules for their excursion in his office before they’d left, but he was still pleased that even as tightly wound as Yūrei was, she was obeying them and staying at his side as they hopped rooftops toward the gates of the village. 

____

Because he really didn’t want to have to send ANBU after her. 

____

He could have shunshin-ed them both, but this was a good warm-up, and his muscles were nice and loose by the time they made it to the clearing he’d had in mind to start their game. 

____

“Okay, let’s go over rules of engagement,” he said, shrugging out of his coat and hanging it over a nearby low branch. “No jutsu of _any_ kind. _Especially_ shunshin.”

____

She nodded, shifting her weight from foot to foot and looking around the clearing. 

____

He started undoing the buttons of his uniform top, and he saw her stop moving as she realized. 

____

Her eyes widened, and color started creeping into the fair skin of her cheeks, but she didn’t look away, openly staring as he revealed the long-sleeved and skin-tight black shirt he wore beneath his uniform, because the grey shirt’s fabric bothered the scars on his back and shoulders when it rubbed over them. 

____

Ibiki smiled slowly and moved toward her like a predator, his big shoulders rolling with each step. 

____

It was another tactic he used in his interrogations, but with his uniform and coat on, the effect was altogether different. _That_ was for intimidation, for striking fear into the hearts and minds of his “guests”. And that slow smile never reached his eyes, not like it was doing now.

____

Right now, he wanted to intimidate her, yes, but only a little, because after all the object of this game was simply to catch her and subdue her, not utterly destroy her once he got his hands on her. 

____

So he took the time to show her his body, and let her make her own decisions on how capable it might be in achieving that goal. 

____

“If I can get my hands on you, and keep you restrained for five seconds, then I win,” he finished. 

____

“Can I fight you to try and get away?” 

____

“By all means, fight me.” 

____

“Like _actually_ fight you?” She looked a bit concerned the prospect. 

____

Was she worried about the possibility of hurting him? _How adorable._ “Yes, _actually_ fight me.” 

____

“If you say so….” 

____

Ibiki snorted in amusement. “Five minutes, girlie. Ready?” 

____

She nodded. 

____

“Set?” 

____

She bolted. 

____

“You little _shit!_ ” 

____

All he got in response was a crazed giggle as she tore off through the trees, and he couldn’t help but laugh as he launched his big body after her. 

____

_Fuck_ , he thought a moment later as he watched her outstrip him in seconds. _She_ is _fast._

____

Three minutes in to the chase his fingertips brushed her ankle as he reached out to grab her, but his fist closed on empty air. 

____

She squealed in both fear and delight and upped her speed, no doubt after a shot of adrenaline. 

____

Two minutes after that, he started gaining on her again. 

____

This time he aimed for her wrist as he pulled up to her side, but he was rewarded with empty air once again as she sprang straight up instead of forward, grabbing a tree branch above her head and swinging her body around to flee in the direction they’d come from. 

____

_Evasive little thing._

____

Ibiki had a flash of uneasiness. 

____

He really, _really_ did not want to have to send ANBU after her. 

____

_No, no – she won’t._ He was confident, and he did the same maneuver she had and followed after her. 

____

And then his heart jumped into his throat as he caught sight of her once more, too far away to help but just in time to watch as her foot slipped from the branch she’d landed on, and he heard her yelp sharply in surprise before she caught herself with chakra. 

____

After that, she leapt down to the ground to continue running from him. 

____

But she was slowing down, and Ibiki caught her two minutes later by dropping down from the trees and landing directly in her path, lunging forward and seizing her wrist as she skidded to a halt and turned to flee again. 

____

Yūrei was yanked off her feet, and her sandaled foot came flying at the side of his head as she readjusted on the fly. He blocked it with his other hand, reflexively closing his fingers around her ankle. 

____

He realized his mistake too late as she again twisted like a fish in his grip, and he caught a glimpse of bared teeth and an absolutely _feral_ expression on her face. 

____

_What the –_

____

Her fist hit him square on the nose. 

____

“ ** _FUCK!_** ” Ibiki roared, all but flinging Yūrei away from him as white exploded across his vision, and he expected to hear her take off again as he yanked one of his gloves off to shove his hand under his nose, and it came away bloody. 

____

But no, she was still sprawled on the ground in front of him, he realized, leaning forward and pinching his nostrils closed. 

____

And she was utterly spent, her chest and belly rapidly rising and falling as she breathed harshly and stared up at the sky above them. 

____

But she was beaming as she gasped out between heaves, “Seven… and a… half… minutes….” 

____

_Little shit._ He turned to spit out the bright red blood that had already run into his mouth from his sinus cavity, and then grinned widely, shaking his head because she’d gotten him but good. 

____

“Congratulations, girlie – you broke my nose.” 

____

She struggled up onto her elbows, and he burst out laughing at the mortified look on her face. 

____

“We’ll call it a draw, how about that?” He was still chuckling as he crouched down beside her, bracing his other hand on the ground before he settled into a cross-legged position and kept his head leaned forward. 

____

She flopped back down with a groan and threw her arm across her eyes. 

____

They stayed that way for a few minutes, until he could release his nostrils and not have blood dribble out. 

____

“You’re used to fighting people bigger than you,” he commented, pulling his glove back on and leaning back on his palms. 

____

“I am not even five-four,” she said sardonically. “Almost _everybody_ is bigger than me.” 

____

“That’s fair.” He reclined into a laying-down position with his hands laced behind his head, listening to the wind through the leaves. “… Kisame Hoshigaki, eh?” 

____

“And Zabuza.” 

____

“The three of you were close?” 

____

She was quiet, then answered with a soft, “Yeah.” 

____

“You miss them, don’t you?” 

____

An even softer, “Yeah,” followed by a sigh. “Yeah, I do.” 

____

“And you have absolutely no clue what they’re up to at the moment, right?” 

____

“Couldn’t even begin to guess.” 

____

Ibiki didn’t answer – she would fill the silence if she felt she had to, and that would mean she’d lied to him. 

____

But she was quiet, save for the steady rhythm of her breathing, and he wondered if she was back in Kiri in her memories. 

____

“What was the nature of your relationship with them, exactly?” he asked after a few moments, closing his eyes and enjoying the warmth of the sunlight on his broad chest. 

____

He had just started to wonder if she would answer him, when she finally did. “… Kisame was like the big brother I never had. He trained me in taijutsu to fight people his size, like you.” 

____

“Well, he did a good job with that, at least.” Ibiki kept his voice neutral as he remembered the blue-skinned man slaughtering his comrades before jumping backwards off a cliff. 

____

He did mean it though, because his scarred face was going to have at least one black eye by the end of the day. 

____

“What about Zabuza?”

____

“My best friend. Kisame and I were his only ones… he just tolerated most people, usually.” 

____

He opened his eyes and sat up when he heard her shift on the ground, and she sat up as well, watching him. 

____

“Is your nose really broken? 

____

He reached up and felt it – it was swollen already, and hurt much more sharply on one side than the other. “You definitely cracked it, at the least.” 

____

“… You did say to _actually_ fight you.” 

____

“Yes, yes I did.” He got to his feet and offered her his hand, pulling her up easily when she took it. 

____

“I still feel bad.” 

____

He chuckled, even though it hurt. “Don’t. You’re going to have a fan club when it gets around.” 

____

Anko at least was never going to let him live it down; that much was certain. 

____


	4. Very Promising Progress

Ibiki shunshin-ed them back to the Intelligence Division after he’d retrieved his coat and uniform shirt.

“Go take a hot shower, and come see me in my office when you’re done,” he said to Yūrei after they’d been buzzed into T&I. “And not a _word_ from either of you,” he barked at Shinobu and Mozuku as the younger men's jaws dropped at the sight of his face.

He went to the kitchen first to wash the rest of the blood off, and he ignored the waves of fresh pain afterward as he settled behind his desk and pulled a stack of reports closer.

Twenty minutes later, he looked up as Yūrei ambled in and stretched out on his couch, her feet toward the door and her head resting on the bicep of her arm folded beneath her head.

“How are you doing?” he asked, turning toward her and leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

She yawned. “My brain’s still racing, but now my body feels like it's made of stone.”

“Let’s try some breathing. No, keep laying down,” he said when she moved to sit up. “Ready?” She nodded, then took a deep breath and held it, and he started counting. “One… two… three… four.” She exhaled, and he timed that as well.

Another inhale. Four seconds. Another exhale. Four seconds.

“Good. Keep that up for a bit longer.”

She was sleeping in less than a minute and Ibiki smiled and sat back in his chair, folding his arms and rubbing his thumb over the scar splitting his bottom lip as he looked down at the woman laying on his couch.

Soon, he’d bring her back to the hospital to get her brain’s chemical levels re-evaluated, and depending on the level of improvement, he might not have to hold her at T&I much longer.

He would have to keep monitoring her, though – just because she was rebounding relatively well for the moment didn’t mean her demons were gone.

Ibiki knew that much from personal experience, and he ran a hand over the bandana on his head as the old scars prickled.

_Probably three times a week, just to be safe,_ he decided, and his chest tightened slightly when he thought about not seeing her in the halls of his department every day. 

Yūrei let out a soft snore, and he stood, silently shrugging out of his long black coat and laying it over her carefully before he sat back down to continue through the reports.

He picked up the next one – it was Anko’s, and he heard her voice in his mind from the evening before:

_“Are you going to keep her, Ibiki?” Anko was watching him shrewdly as she sat beside him at the bar._

_He snorted as he raised his glass of whisky and took a long pull, baring his teeth at the burn in his chest that followed. “You make her sound like a stray puppy.”_

_“She’s not that far from it, honestly.” The purple-haired kunoichi waited a beat. “I think you should, though. Keep her, I mean.”_

_“Is that so.” It wasn’t a question._

_Anko responded anyway. “Yeah. She’s good for you.”_

_He raised an eyebrow, feeling his scar pull._

_“Don’t look at me like that,” she said, shaking her head. “You two aren’t even_ dating _and the effect she has on you is unreal. I haven’t seen you this happy in… actually no, I’ve never seen you this happy. And you deserve that, Ibiki. Plus, you need a support system too, because for all you’ve been preaching to her, you’ve never been the best at following your own advice.”_

_“I have you, don’t I?” He took another drink of whisky and raised his empty glass to the bartender. “Even if you are an annoying little shit sometimes, gaki.”_

_Because she was right, of course._

_“One annoying little_ sister _doesn’t make a support system.” She prodded him in the side before finishing her drink in one swallow and setting the glass down on top of a handful of bills. “Keep her, Ibiki - she thinks the world of you, anyway.”_

Yūrei shifted on the couch, and he glanced over to see her burrowing deeper into his coat.

Ibiki smiled to himself as he wondered how much protest he’d get when he asked for it back.

**********

An hour and a half later, he’d made it through the stack of reports and Yūrei was still sleeping soundly. 

What he had in his mind was to bend down and gently shake her shoulder to wake her.

What he did was slip his arms beneath the coat and her body and stand, freezing in place as he abruptly registered her weight in his arms, his breath catching in his chest as he realized what he'd just done, and he looked down to see if he'd woken her after all.

But no, she was still out like a light, her face turned into his arm, and he exhaled slowly.

Walking her over to her room took only a few moments, and Shinobu wisely jumped up from the desk to open and hold the door for him.

Besides their all of three-seconds spar, Ibiki hadn’t had her this close to him since her panic attack in her apartment before he’d brought her to T&I, and as he laid her down on her side in the bed, he suddenly realized he wanted to crawl in next to her.

He wanted to tuck her in against the curve of his big body, to wrap his arms around her and to rest his chin on top of her head as he drifted off to sleep.

He wanted it so badly he actually lifted a foot off the ground before stopping himself and settling for adjusting his coat over her once more, brushing her hair back from her face and gently tucking the stray strands behind her ear.

She blinked up at him and smiled sleepily, and he couldn’t help himself – he reached down again and stroked her cheek with the back of his gloved fingers.

“Go back to sleep, girlie,” he whispered.

She tugged his coat up to her chin and closed her eyes with a contented sigh, and Anko’s voice echoed in his mind again: _“She thinks the world of you, anyway.”_

He moved away from the bed and out of the room, closing the door as quietly as he could behind him. 

**********

The coat was returned without him asking and with no protest whatsoever, only a shy smile and a soft “thank you” when he went to check on Yūrei before he left for the day. 

He had planned to let her have the thing until the next morning, if she’d wanted, but she’d slipped out of bed and passed it to him the moment he’d stepped into the room, and Ibiki draped it over his arm before telling her goodnight.

After the door of the department thudded closed behind him he pulled the coat on, and he caught a trace of her scent as it settled across his broad shoulders.

He turned his face into the collar and breathed in a little deeper, and the sense of peace that immediately settled in him as a result made him think Anko might have a point.

Maybe Yūrei _was_ good for him.

**********

Ibiki caught movement out the corner of his eye, and looked up from his desk just as Inoichi stopped in the doorway to his office.

“Good mor – what the _hell_? What happened to your face, Ibiki? Someone slip their cuffs and pop you one?” The blonde shinobi’s brow furrowed. 

A muscle ticked in Ibiki’s jaw. “What do you want?”

“Just came by to check on our little friend from Kiri. It’s been six days – how’s the rebuild coming?”

“So far it’s going well.”

“Good, good…. So what happened to you?”

“Our ‘little friend from Kiri’ packs quite a punch.” 

A slow grin spread across Inoichi’s face. “Pressed one too many buttons?”

“Just a quick spar.”

The other man chuckled and tapped the side of his own nose. “Broken?”

“Only slightly.”

“You should get that taken care of.”

Ibiki shrugged. “I’m taking her to the hospital tomorrow to get re-evaluated. I’ll do it then.”

**********

Ibiki leaned against the wall with his hands in his pockets as he watched the medic-nin approach Yūrei.

“So just like last time, we’re going to examine you with chakra to check the chemical levels in your brain,” the white-dressed woman said. “Ready?”

The kunoichi looked apprehensive as the swirling green energy gathered, and her blue eyes moved to meet Ibiki’s much darker ones across the room.

He nodded, half-smiling at her, and winked.

She relaxed and nodded to the medic-nin, who pressed her left palm to Yūrei’s forehead, concentrating and jotting down numbers with her right.

A few moments later it was done, and the medic-nin promised to be back shortly.

“It feels so weird when they do that.” Yūrei rubbed the bridge of her nose, squinching up her face like she had to sneeze. 

“Very weird,” he agreed, having just had his nose healed and thus able to sympathize.

“I wonder how much difference a week makes,” she wondered aloud. 

“It makes enough,” Ibiki answered. “You’ve come far, girlie.” And he was so very proud of her for it. 

She was much more outspoken and social, and quicker to laugh and tease - hell, she'd even challenged Tonbo to a push-up competition earlier that morning, only to collapse into a fit of laughter before they'd even hit fifty because he'd kept telling her jokes to throw her focus.

And best of all: instead of a death-wish, Ibiki could see that there was a fierce light behind her bright blue eyes that was growing stronger with each passing day.

“You think I can go home?” she asked hopefully.

“Not today. But soon, maybe,” he added as her face fell. “And when you do, we’re going to celebrate.”

Yūrei perked up, tilting her head to the side curiously. “Oh?”

He nodded. “I’m thinking Yakiniku. How does that sound?” 

Now she smiled. “Like heaven.”

“Something to look forward to, then.” 

And when they were sitting across from each other at the booth, and the right moment arrived, Ibiki would tell her how he felt about her, because he was tired of fighting himself. 

Somehow, with no effort at all, Yūrei had worked her way under his thick and scarred skin, and taken up residence in both his mind and his heart.

The medic-nin came back in, smiling. “Good news! Your serotonin and dopamine levels have improved significantly. Much more than we’d anticipated actually, so you’re looking very good!”

She pumped a fist happily. “Alright!”

“We’d like to see you again in three days for another evaluation, okay?”

“Sounds good,” Ibiki said as he stood up from his position against the wall. “We’ll see you then.”

They left the hospital and shunshin-ed back to the Intelligence Division.

**********

Three days later, a few hours after the follow-up, Ibiki leaned against the doorframe to the main area, watching Yūrei chatter happily with Shimon behind the intake desk. 

Their backs were to him, but no sooner had he taken his weight off his feet than she turned around, grinning widely at him when their eyes met. 

He smiled back and raised his hand to crook his index finger at her in a come-here gesture.

“Be right back,” she said to the long-haired chunin at the desk before standing up and strolling confidently toward Ibiki.

_Yeah, it’s time,_ he thought, watching her posture and body language. _She’s ready._

He turned so she could walk past him, and followed her into his office.

She settled in a chair in front of his desk and immediately rocked it back on its hind legs, which he’d noticed over the last few days was something she did when she was in a particularly good mood.

“You look like you’re feeling good,” he said, sitting back in his own chair.

“I am!”

“Good, that’s very good.” He steepled his fingers against his scarred chin and looked at her thoughtfully.

“What’s up?” she asked, smiling brightly at him.

Ibiki smiled back, and his tone was cheerfully conversational, but beneath his outward expression he was focused intently on her reaction as he asked, “How would you feel about killing yourself, Yūrei?”

She recoiled, her eyes widening as she abruptly shook her head.

“ _Fuck_ no,” she said vehemently. “No way.” Her tone suggested the very idea was abhorrent.

_Perfect._ Ibiki was proud, so proud, but he did not let it show on his face.

“What if someone else did it for you?” he offered instead. “An easy death. No pain, just –” He snapped his fingers. “You’d never know. What about that?”

The legs of the chair hit the floor with a thud, and Yūrei’s eyes were hard now – she was pissed. 

“I don’t want to die, Ibiki. Not today, not tomorrow, and not next week, next month, or next year either, okay? I want to _live_.”

“I know, girlie, I know.” And now Ibiki smiled widely at her. “So go pack your bag. You’re going home.”

Her jaw dropped as she let out a startled squeak, blue eyes wide.

“Go on,” he said, making a shoo-ing motion at her as he leaned back in his chair and kept grinning.

She leapt up so quickly the chair toppled over, though she didn’t notice because she was already in the hallway, and he heard her joyful shout when she made it to the main area.

“I’M GOING _HOME!_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this seems a little too good to be true so far I just wanna say that while I've tweaked the details for story purposes, IRL I did spend ten days in a mental hospital after a psychotic episode, and by the time I was released I had gotten enough of what I needed between better medications and actual therapy that yeah, the idea of fucking off this mortal coil was a biiiig big nope.
> 
> Would've been nice to have a tall dark secret-teddy-bear for a shrink though.... ah well.


	5. The Point of No Return

Ibiki shunshin-ed them to her front door and pulled the key from the pocket of his coat to hand to her, following as she stepped inside.

The cat was waiting at the threshold, crying loudly, and Yūrei scooped it up and buried her face in its tortoiseshell fur. “I missed you so much.”

The feelings appeared to be mutual – the cat headbutted her, purring loudly.

Ibiki stepped forward and reached out, rubbing the animal behind the ears. “She loves you very much.”

“I got her right after I got here… She’s been my only constant, no matter what’s happened – us against the world.” She scratched the cat under the chin, and it closed its eyes contentedly. “I’m surprised she’s letting you touch her, actually. She hates anybody that’s not me.”

“I may have bribed her with sashimi a few times.”

“Of course you did,” Yūrei laughed as she set the animal on the floor. “Thank you again for feeding her.” 

“You’re very welcome.”

“You cleaned up some too,” she noted, looking around the studio. “That was sweet of you.”

_More practical, really._ But if she wanted to think he was sweet, he’d take it.

Because Ibiki was positive there wasn’t a single other person in the village who would use that particular adjective in reference to him.

“Oh, before I forget.” He pulled the kunai he’d confiscated from her from his pocket, handing it to her hilt-first. “This is yours.”

Yūrei took it slowly, then grinned mischievously and spun it around her finger before gripping it like a weapon and settling into a fighting stance, holding the knife sideways with her other hand raised and palm open.

“Gonna try and pin me down for it again?” she asked playfully. 

“Don’t tempt me, girlie,” he said with a smirk. “Still want to celebrate later?”

“Definitely!”

“Yakiniku for six?”

“I’ll be there!” 

********* 

Yūrei was early actually.

Ibiki walked into Yakiniku at ten minutes to six and saw her sitting at the end of the bar in civilian clothing and watching the front door. 

She lifted her chin with a smile when she caught sight of him, and he smiled back as he approached and took the stool next to her.

“What are you drinking, girlie?”

“Whisky and soda,” she answered, and he nodded in approval before ordering his own drink as the bartender stepped up to him.

They moved from the bar to a table in the rear, with her facing the kitchen and emergency exit and him facing the entire restaurant.

She shook her head and smiled wryly. “I’m sure glad I trust you, because having my back to this whole room is making my instincts go absolutely nuts.”

The warmth that filled Ibiki’s chest had nothing to do with the whisky he was drinking.

A plate of sliced meat was set on the table, and they made more small talk as they cooked and ate by turns.

His eyes flicked to the door as Asuma Sarutobi walked in, followed by his three genin.

The bearded jonin raised a hand in greeting, then tilted his head curiously as he caught sight of Yūrei.

Ibiki held the man’s gaze but gave no reaction, and after a beat Asuma grinned slyly and settled into the booth with his students.

The rumors would start flying in hours, Ibiki knew, but as he’d never cared what people thought of him before, he certainly wasn’t going to start now.

They called him a sadist, especially the copy-ninja, Hatake. 

They whispered about the scars on his face, on his head – whether they knew how he’d gotten them or not.

They wondered how many more he hid beneath his clothes. 

Ibiki was used to it. 

Besides, at this moment, there was only one person whose opinion made any difference to him.

He debated briefly on telling her his feelings now, or walking her home and telling her there, and decided on her home, where she would be more comfortable and thus more likely to give him an honest response, rather than a public setting where she might feel pressured to react a certain way.

“Will you let me walk you home?” he asked.

“Sure, if you want to.” She reached into her pocket as the bill was set on the table.

“It’s on me,” he interrupted, pulling a few bills from a pocket inside his coat and setting them on the little tray.

She looked surprised, then blushed and smiled shily. “Thanks.”

**********

_Alright,_ Ibiki thought as they stepped up to her front door. _Here we go._

“Yūrei… there’s something I need to tell you.” He turned to face her, taking a small step back as he spoke so that he could watch more of her body language.

She mirrored his movements, and he would have put money on the fact that she’d done it completely subconsciously. 

Her head tipped slightly to the side, questioning, as she looked up at him.

“I’m just going to say it – I like you, Yūrei. I like you a lot… a hell of a lot more than I should, really.”

Yūrei’s eyes went wide, and her jaw dropped as she inhaled sharply.

Ibiki held his breath as he reached forward slowly, giving her plenty of time to say no – praying silently that she wouldn’t – and brushed his gloved fingertips over her cheek before cupping her jaw in his hand.

Her gaze dropped from his eyes to his mouth, and he felt one of her palms settle on the side of his neck.

The feeling of her skin on his sent a rush through him, and he was bending his head down even as she went up on her toes, and he paused, looking her in the eyes again.

“Are you sure?” he breathed.

She kissed him by way of answer, and _oh god_ her lips were soft, and he growled as he wrapped an arm around her waist and held her tightly, angling her head up a little higher and stroking his thumb over her cheek.

Her mouth opened slightly, and he gasped as the tip of her tongue touched the scar splitting his bottom lip.

She pulled back a fraction. “No?”

_Yes._ Ibiki growled again and closed the distance, kissing her hard and stroking forward with his tongue, and he felt her little body all but melt against him as she moaned softly.

But after only a few moments, she pulled back again, breathless. “If we keep this up….”

“Your choice.” His voice was low, and rougher than usual. “Tell me what you want.”

“I want you,” she whispered.

“Then I’m yours.” He kissed her again, and shunshin-ed them without warning to his doorstep.

“What the –?” Yūrei looked around in confusion, and he used those seconds to unlock his front door. “What just happened?”

“My bed is bigger,” he said, taking her hand and tugging her into the house.

“Huh?”

And then he was kissing her, hard, and she moaned into his mouth before yelping in surprise when he lifted her off her feet, wrapping her legs around his waist as he held her off the ground with one arm beneath her for support, the other holding her tightly to him.

Her palms settled on each side of his jaw as she brought their lips together again, and he raised his chin, nipping at her bottom lip before licking into her mouth again to stroke her tongue with his own.

Ibiki took a step back, and then another, maneuvering them toward his bedroom as they kissed, reaching behind his back to open the door with one hand.

The backs of his legs hit the side of his bed, and he sat down slowly, Yūrei now in his lap.

He reached around her, pulling his gloves off behind her back and dropping them to the floor before sliding his hands under her shirt, reveling in the feel of her skin, soft and warm under his palms.

Slipping his fingers below her waist band, he flattened his palms on her rear and pulled her closer to him, settling her against the hard length at his hips.

“Wait-wait-wait,” she said, pulling back, and the fact that she sounded scared, not aroused, cut through his heady thoughts like a blade.

Ibiki stopped immediately, taking his hands off her and going completely still. “What’s wrong?”

“I- I don’t… I can’t….” Yūrei looked like she might cry. “Fuck, I’m sorry.”

“Hey, hey – it’s alright. It’s okay,” he said quickly, and reached up to stroke her cheek again. “Don’t apologize. It’s okay. We can stop.”

“But –” 

“Shhh.” He took her hand in his free one and brought it to his lips so he could kiss her palm. “Listen – you make the rules, alright?”

She still looked unsure.

“… Do you want me to take you home?”

She hesitated, then shook her head. “… No.”

Ibiki could see that she was embarrassed, and he reached up and settled his hand on the nape of her neck, threading his fingers through her hair. “Come here, girlie.” He pulled her forward, gently, and tucked her face into his collar, rubbing his other hand up and down her back. “Just let me hold you for a minute.”

Yūrei sighed, relaxing against him. “Sorry,” she said again.

“You don’t have to be sorry, Yūrei. I should be the one apologizing to you, if anything.”

He should have known better. He _had_ known better. 

He’d just been entirely too caught up in her taste, her scent, and the feel of her body against his to think about anything besides the fact that it had been so _long_.

“It’s not your fault,” she said, picking her head up and looking in his eyes again.

It most certainly was, but he wasn’t going to argue with her, so he just shrugged one of his big shoulders, then quickly kissed her nose and pulled back.

Her giggle sounded relieved, and he grinned playfully at her as he brushed her hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear and rubbing his thumb over her cheek as she smiled back shyly and reached up, stroking her fingers over the back of his hand.

Her brow furrowed slightly as she felt the raised patterns of his scars, and Ibiki hesitated briefly, then pulled his hand away and brought it between them, placing it palm-down on her thigh.

She looked down, tracing one fingertip over the old burns, gently rubbing her thumb across the punctures where they’d put the screws to him.

It wasn’t until Yūrei abruptly looked up at him, her bright blue eyes filled with worry, that Ibiki realized he was trembling, his breaths shallow and catching in his throat.

She wrapped her arms around him now, her hand on his nape gently pulling him closer, and he leaned forward and buried his face in her neck, sliding his arms around her with a shaky exhale.

Yūrei spoke softly to him, murmuring soothing words as she rubbed up and down his broad back with both hands.

Ibiki focused on the sound of her voice, the warmth of her body beneath his hands, the easy weight of her in his lap, and as he nuzzled against the column of her throat and breathed in her scent, he slowly pulled himself back to reality – out of that room and that chair, away from the sensations of the wire biting into his wrists, of each wave of pain from the screw’s turns, until the metal points had protruded from his palms.

He was in Yūrei’s arms, and she was in his.

He was home.

He was safe.

“Thank you,” he whispered, and kissed his way up her neck. “Thank you.” His scarred lips brushed the edge of her jaw, and he brought his mouth to hers to kiss her softly. “Thank you.” He rested his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. _Thank you._

She placed her left hand on his cheek, stroking her thumb back and forth over the scar there, and her right hand flattened in between his pecs, directly over his heart.

And as he settled his much larger palm over her hand on his chest, covering it completely, Ibiki had a thought that somehow both elated and utterly terrified him:

He could fall for her.

It was almost enough to send him back into his panic attack, and he fought to stay calm, succeeding only by inches as he raised his head to look her in the eyes again.

“Stay with me tonight?”

Okay, that had definitely _not_ been what he’d planned on asking her.

But it was too late now – the words were out of his mouth, and he waited for her response.

“If you want me to…?” Her voice rose at the end, questioning as it trailed off.

_More than I want my next breath._ “I’d like it very much if you did.”

“Then I will.”

Ibiki stood up with her and turned so that he could sit her down on the bed. “Let’s get more comfortable then, shall we?” He shrugged his coat off and laid it over a chair, then kicked off his sandals before he started unbuttoning his uniform shirt to reveal the black long-sleeved one beneath it. 

“I can give you a shirt to sleep in, if you want,” he said, looking over at Yūrei.

“Sure, thanks.”

He moved to his closet and pulled one of his few t-shirts from a hanger, tossing it over to her.

She stood from the bed and reached up to untie her hitai-ate, laying it over his coat, and then pulled her sandals off to set them under the chair.

“I should warn you, before I – well…” Ibiki gestured to his chest before grasping the hem of his undershirt with both hands, waiting for her reply before he pulled it off.

Yūrei nodded, her eyes softening, and he yanked the skin-tight shirt over his head in one move and turned back toward the closet, putting a hand on each side of the doorframe.

He heard her sharp inhale and hung his head, only to stiffen in surprise when her arms wrapped around his waist from behind, and then he relaxed as her cheek rested against one of his scarred shoulders.

“You’re still you,” she said softly, and pressed her lips to his spine in a kiss.

Ibiki’s hands slipped off the frame on either side of him, and he turned around slowly in her arms to see her looking up into his eyes.

_Why did you have to hurt so, in order to come into my life?_ he wondered as he gazed down at her, then bent his neck to kiss her forehead. _I wish the circumstances had been different for how you got here… but I can’t say I’m not pleased with the way things have gone since I walked into that hospital room._

Because in bringing Yūrei out of her darkness, she had brought him out of his.


	6. Tasting Sunshine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EXPLICIT CONTENT IN-BOUND

The sound of his alarm at roused Ibiki from his sleep, and he reached out and slapped the clock into silence without opening his eyes.

Yūrei murmured sleepily and snuggled closer to him from behind, sliding her arm over his waist and pressing the length of her body against his. 

_Oh… that’s quite nice…._

He lay still, listening to the peaceful, steady rhythm of her breathing and very much enjoying her warmth against his back.

But too soon his secondary alarm went off, and he felt her shift, then bolt upright.

“Hey now, girlie,” he said, sitting up quickly. “You’re alright.”

“Yeah… yeah, sorry,” she yawned, rubbing her eyes. “It took me a second to realize where I was.”

Ibiki slipped out of the bed and moved to his closet, and when he’d finished dressing he stepped out to see that Yūrei had done the same and was sitting on the edge of his bed.

She was leaned forward with her head down, elbows on her knees and hands clasped loosely in front of her, and she looked up as he took a step closer.

“What are your plans for today?”

Yūrei thought for a moment. “Probably some training, and maybe drop by the Mission Room later to see what I can pick up.”

“About that.” Ibiki’s tone was gentle. “I’ll need to sign off on anything assigned to you, or anything you volunteer for. You’re doing well, Yūrei, but I don’t want you to deal with too much added stress right now. You might feel a lot better, but the truth is that you’re still very much in recovery.”

She considered it for a moment, then nodded. “I guess that’s fair, but if I’m going to be chasing cats and picking up trash like a genin then I’ll need to take as many as I can get, because I was stretching my ryo pretty thin before I snapped, and I don’t have much left put away.”

“You can always help out at T&I,” he suggested, and shook his head with a smile when her eyebrows shot up. “Clerically, girlie – filing and such.”

“Pushing paper,” she mused, then shrugged. “If it pays the bills.”

“How about we hit the Mission Room together this afternoon and get you set up with a run of light-duty assignments, and once you’ve worked through them, we’ll re-evaluate.”

“Sounds good to me.”

**********

Ibiki saw several heads turn as they entered the Mission Room, and he watched several gazes flick from him to Yūrei and back, looks of confusion turning into calculation.

He was proud to see that she was meeting the stares of the surrounding shinobi head on, her chin raised confidently and challenge glinting in her eyes - 

And then some idiot let loose a shrill wolf-whistle.

Ibiki whirled, his coat flaring and murder in his mind, but Yūrei was faster – she pivoted in the direction of the sound and lashed out her arm with her hand in a half seal, and an orb of water the size of a pebble shot from her fingertips, nailing one Genma Shiranui right in the middle of his forehead before exploding in a small splash.

The Mission Room exploded in laughter as he let out a startled yelp, the senbon in his mouth falling to the ground.

Even the Hokage was smiling.

Ibiki chuckled. “Nice one, girlie.”

Yūrei grinned, lowering her arm. “Anybody else?” she called out, nonchalantly slipping her hands in her pockets and leaning her weight on one foot.

He couldn’t help himself, and he reached out to ruffle a gloved hand over her hair. 

“Seems like you’ve got this handled, so I’ll see you later. Try and play nice.”

“Later, Ibiki,” she answered over her shoulder.

He was still laughing to himself as he left the room.

**********

Ibiki looked up when Anko appeared in his doorway.

The grin she was sporting unnerved him.

“What did you do?” he asked flatly, standing up and preparing for damage control.

“Oh, it’s not what I’ve _done_ ,” she answered, leaning against the frame and folding her arms. “It’s what I’m gonna _be_ doing.”

“Which is?”

“Shushu-ya at eight.”

“And what are you leaving out?” Ibiki growled, because that was her ‘I’m-toying-with-you’ tone, and he was definitely not in the mood.

Her grin widened. “Yūrei’s coming.”

“Fine. I’ll have to meet you –”

“Along with Izumo and Kotetsu,” she interrupted.

Ibiki’s jaw closed with an audible snap. “Come again?”

“Our little Yūrei is making more _friends_ ,” Anko squealed, clasping her hands to her chest. “Apparently, she nailed Genma with some kind of water shot, and those two knuckleheads were so impressed they invited her out for drinks. Oh, and Iruka from the Academy too. And _of course_ she invited _me_ to join them.”

Ibiki closed his eyes and reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose. 

He knew the sensei at least was the responsible sort, but he shuddered to think of what kind of mischief a drunken Anko and those other two chunin would be capable of pulling Yūrei into.

Maybe he could just shadow – 

“And don’t you _dare_ think about shadowing us,” Anko said, warning in her tone.

“Like you’d even know!” he shot back, irritated that she’d been able to read him.

“You think you’re so smooth, just because you used to be ANBU!”

He folded his arms and raised an eyebrow at her. “Used to be?”

“Look,” she said exasperatedly. “I won’t let anything happen, alright? I’ll behave.”

Ibiki snorted, sitting back down behind his desk. “Get back to work, gaki.”

She stuck her tongue out at him before leaving and he watched her move down the hall, waiting until she’d turned the corner before he leaned forward and sighed, resisting the urge to slam his head into his desk.

His cranium had dealt with enough trauma in his life.

**********

Barely an hour after Anko had left, Yūrei ambled into Ibiki’s office and settled into one of the chairs in front of his desk, immediately rocking it back on its hind legs.

“Can we talk?”

“Of course.” He laid his pen down and sat forward to give her his full attention.

“Izumo and Kotetsu invited me out for drinks tonight, along with Iruka-sensei.”

“Are you going to go?”

“Yeah. I asked Anko if she wanted to come and she said she would. Do you want to come too?”

“It might be better if I didn’t.” He wasn’t stupid – he knew full well that he made most people nervous. “But thank you for the invite.”

“… You know they’re going to ask,” she said after a moment.

“Whatever you want to tell them is up to you.” And he wouldn’t mind hearing what it would be – they hadn’t discussed the night before at all, not that he wanted to push her.

Yūrei was quiet, rocking the chair as she thought and staring at the space above his desk. “I didn’t want to assume anything,” she finally said.

“Come here, girlie.” Ibiki stood up and opened his arms, and she let the chair fall flat to get up and step into them. “Listen, if you _want_ to tell them anything, just tell them I’m yours. How’s that?”

“You’re mine?” Her voice was soft and unsure against his chest, and he held her a little tighter.

“If you want me to be, then yes, I am.” 

She returned the squeeze with a happy hum, and then stepped back to look up at him. “I think I’d like that.”

It was better than he’d hoped for, and he mentally sighed in relief.

He knew she was wary, and still hurting a great deal over her civilian ex, and while Ibiki still wanted _very_ much to snap at least one of that fucking idiot’s larger and more important bones – a humerus maybe, or even a femur depending on his mood – he’d promised her he wouldn’t approach the sorry excuse for a human.

Ibiki cupped her face in his hand, and smiled when she closed her eyes and leaned into his touch. “Did you pick up some missions?”

Yūrei pulled a handful of scrolls from the pocket of her flak vest to pass to him. “All D-ranks – your regular genin busywork.”

He read over them and nodded, satisfied. “Tackling any of these today?”

“Actually I was headed to do some more training, since I haven’t had a decent session in over a month now, and I’m not counting you chasing me since I was out of my mind and sloppy as hell at the time.”

“And yet you still managed to break my nose when I caught you,” he teased.

She shrugged, blushing slightly as she grinned and dropped his gaze. “Lucky shot.”

 _Like hell that was luck._

Even run ragged and sleep-deprived, she was still a capable fighter thanks to her training with both the Demon and the Monster of the Hidden Mist.

“Well, why don’t we spar for real sometime then?” he suggested.

“We could do that, sure. Just let me know when.”

“Will do.” He smiled widely. “Looking forward to it, girlie.”

_And this time I won’t underestimate you and get my face busted in._

**********

Ibiki stood up from his laid-down position on a branch, staying hidden in the tree as the group of chunin and Anko stumbled out of Shushu-ya’s entrance.

“G’night, Kiri,” Kotetsu called happily. “Get home safe, eh?”

“You too, Hedgehog!” Yūrei answered back, raising a hand in farewell. “And you, Izumo!”

 _Nicknames. How adorable._

“D’you need someone to walk you home?” Iruka asked, rubbing the back of his neck and blushing as he turned to Yūrei, after the other two males had walked off. “It’s pretty late.”

“Nah, I’m just right around the corner, but thanks.” She grinned at the sensei. “You gonna be okay?”

“Oh yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I’ll see you around.” He strolled away, smiling.

_Good for you, pretty boy – you get to keep your teeth._

“You sure you’re good, Yūrei?” Anko asked, giggling.

“Yup, yup, for sure,” she answered, weaving slightly on her feet. “I really am right around the corner.”

“If you say so!” The purple-haired kunoichi waggled her fingers in a goodbye before shunshin-ing away with a puff of smoke.

“Oof, I definitely can’t pull _that_ off right now,” Yūrei mumbled. “Walking it is.”

And she promptly set off in the wrong direction.

Ibiki sighed, materializing in front of her in a swirl of leaves. “Wrong way, girlie.”

“Hey!” She leapt back, simultaneously drawing a kunai in a surprisingly smooth motion, before settling into a fighting stance. “Wait… Ibiki? What’re you doing here?” The knife lowered slightly. “You scared the fuck outta me!”

“Making sure you get home okay.” He stepped forward. “You know it’s almost one in the morning?”

“Shit, is it really?” She holstered the blade and rubbed a hand down her face with a groan. “Fuck.”

“Your apartment is this way.” Ibiki took her hand gently and led her in the right direction. “Come on.”

Yūrei mumbled something, and he stopped.

_Did you just - ?_ “What was that?”

“Said what‘f I wanna go b’you?” she yawned. “Bigger bed.”

“You want to come home with me?”

She nodded. “Bed. Bigger. Better.”

Ibiki considered it. “… Fine.” He turned and hugged her to him, shunshin-ing them to his door. 

Where Yūrei promptly turned even paler than usual, before pushing herself away from him to throw up over the side of his front porch, her hands on her knees as she wretched.

Ibiki sighed, kneeling down to hold her hair back. “Sorry, girlie.”

“S’okay,” she mumbled, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Least I’m sober now.” She spit again, grimacing. “Ugh, you wouldn’t happen to have an extra toothbrush, would you?”

“I actually do, as a matter of fact.” He unlocked the door to let them in, leading her to the bathroom in his bedroom. “Should be under the sink. Toothpaste is right there.”

She thanked him, then shut the door, and he heard the water start running.

Ibiki shed his clothing, tossing the coat onto the chair and the rest of it onto the floor, slipping into his bed just as Yūrei stepped out of the bathroom.

“There are shirts in the closet if you want one to sleep in,” he said, pulling the blanket up to his chest. “Catch the light before you get in, eh?”

She didn’t go into the closet, just crossed the room to flick the light off, and Ibiki heard clothing hitting the floor as his eyes adjusted. 

“Yūrei?”

Then he felt her crawl into the bed next to him, and he realized what her aim had been when he reached out to pull her into his arms.

_Sweet holy fuck – she’s naked._

“What are you doing?” he asked, his rough voice low as he skimmed his hands along her body and felt her press up close to him. “Hmm?”

Yūrei didn’t answer, only moved so that her face was level with his and brought their mouths together, licking forward with her tongue when he kissed her back, arching her little body against his larger one.

“Trying to start something?” he murmured, coming up for air after a moment. 

“And what if I am?” She brushed her lips over his, her hand on his jawline.

“You’ve been drinking….” 

“Oh, I’m sober now, trust me on that.” She nipped at his bottom lip, trailing her fingers down the side of his neck and over his throat.

“You sure about this?” He kissed her again, but he wanted to be certain, because he didn’t want to scare her again if he went for her.

And Ibiki was less than one thin inch away from going for her.

Yūrei’s reply was to run her hand down his chest and belly and settle her palm between his legs, gripping him gently through his boxer-briefs, moaning into his mouth when his hands tightened on her in response.

Ibiki pulled back once more, breathless as he hardened under her touch. “Last chance, Yūrei – are you _sure_ you want to do this?”

“Stop talking.” She gripped him tighter and sucked his bottom lip between her teeth, and he growled against her mouth and surged forward, settling over her with a hand on either side of her head.

“You want it, you got it.” He kissed her lips, her cheek, then down her neck, feeling her arch against him as he moved lower.

She moaned softly when he nipped lightly at her skin over her throat, and gasped when he reached down with one hand to stroke her between her legs.

He pulled one nipple into his mouth and she started to pant, working her hips against his hand on her.

Ibiki kept going lower, down her stomach with licking, sucking kisses, and a gentle nip or two – he liked the way she shuddered when he did that – and he paused at her pelvis, his nose brushing her lower belly as she writhed under him.

“Ibiki…” she whimpered, her hands on his shoulders. “Don’t stop….”

“Where do you want me?” He dragged his tongue languidly from one hip bone to the other. “Hmm?”

She whimpered again, arching her hips. “Please….”

“Where?” Exhaling the word, he brought his lips close, so very close to her core, where he could already feel how hot she was for him. “Tell me.” He settled his palms on her hips, pressing them down into the mattress to stop her from arching up against his mouth. “Here?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Yūrei struggled under his grip. “Ibiki, _please_ ….”

“Well, since you asked so politely –”

Ibiki licked slowly upward between her folds, and that thin inch disappeared.

He pressed his mouth against her softest skin and went for her with his tongue, and she came undone quickly, crying out as her hips bucked wildly.

When she stilled, panting, he sat back and reached down to yank his underwear off, tossing them to the floor and moving back up to settle his hips in the cradle of her thighs, rubbing the length of himself against her and grinning as she gasped because she was even more sensitive there after her release.

“Tell me when,” he murmured, knowing it would be now, loving the things he was doing to her.

“Now,” she moaned. “Now, please….”

Ibiki reached down to place the weeping, blunt head of his shaft at her center, and pressed in slowly.

“Fuck, you’re tight,” he hissed, fighting the urge to slam home and instead rocking forward and back, a little more each time. She was so wet for him, and she felt so goddamned _good_. “Oh my God… _Yūrei_ ….”

She lifted her hips into his next move forward, and they both gasped as he entered her fully.

Ibiki clenched his jaw to stop from exploding into her right then and there, and he started up a rhythm with his hips, slowly, then curled one arm underneath her and picked up speed.

Yūrei whimpered in pleasure, wrapping her arms around him.

Ibiki came when she bit him on his collarbone, pulling out of her as his lower back and belly tightened up on him, his hips curling forward with his release.

“Fucking _hell_ …” he groaned, dropping his head into her neck. “That was… amazing.”

Yūrei hmm’d softly in agreement, stroking her hands up and down his scarred back, and he kissed her throat before tossing the sheets to the side and moving off of her to grab a towel.

He wiped himself off and then cleaned her gently, chuckling when she flinched as he went between her legs. “Easy now, girlie.”

Tossing the terrycloth to the side, he settled down next to her in the bed, wrapping her in his arms with her shoulders against his chest.

“Sweet dreams,” he murmured, kissing the top of her head.

“Only if they’re of you,” she answered softly, then yawned, snuggling in even closer against him.

As he fell asleep, Ibiki thought that he might very well want to do this every night, for the rest of his life.

Only this time, it wasn’t quite as terrifying.

**********

Ibiki groaned at the sound of his alarm clock and rolled over to silence it, rolling back to pull Yūrei into his arms and bury his face in her hair.

“I could get used to this,” he murmured sleepily, skimming his hand over her breasts, along her belly, and down to her hip to pull her against his erection. “I really, really could.”

“Mmm….” Yūrei wriggled back against him. “Me too, I think.”

“I’ll have to get that lovely bed in room One brought to your apartment, then.” He slipped his hand between her legs, and she opened them for him with a happy sigh.

Stroking lightly, he teased her until she was squirming beneath his hand. “Ibikiii….”

“I love the way you say my name,” he purred, rewarding her with heavier touches before slipping a finger inside of her.

“And I love the way you touch me,” she breathed in response, rolling her hips forward and back, against his hand and his shaft.

_I think I might love you_ , he thought, and bit his lip to keep from speaking the words aloud, instead sliding a second finger inside, stretching her and drawing a soft gasp from her throat.

“Can we?” she asked plaintively. “Please?”

“Hmm…” he rumbled, deep in his chest, and rocked his hips against her. “I think so….”


	7. A Serious Sparring Session

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry in advance if the POV gets a little wonky, I tried to make it as smooth as I could!

Five of them made their way to Training Field Three, Yūrei and Ibiki in the lead, trailed by Anko, Izumo, and Kotetsu

“My money is on Kiri! No offense,” the spiky-haired shinobi added hastily, when Ibiki cocked a brow at him. “Just, you know, underdog and all.”

“I think the hedgehog has a crush on you,” Anko whispered, nudging Yūrei and smiling.

“Nah, really?’ she murmured back with a wide grin. “What was your first clue?”

“I still don’t see why we have to have an audience,” Ibiki grumbled as they reached the training field near the Memorial Stone, with its three wooden posts casting almost no shadow in the sun directly overhead.

“Because this is going to be great!” Anko squealed, clapping her hands together.

“A hundred on Morino,” Izumo said quietly to Kotetsu. “Sorry, Kiri,” he added with a grin and shrug. “I just don’t know enough about you to bet on you.”

“You will in a few.” She winked, before turning to Ibiki. “Ready?”

They shunshin-ed to the tops of the posts on the left and right.

He was out of his normal uniform, instead in standard navy shirt and pants with a flak jacket, a tool pouch on his hip, and holsters on his thigh, and her chest puffed slightly with pride that he was taking her seriously.

“Break his nose again!” Anko shouted, her hands around her mouth.

“ _She broke his nose?!_ ” Izumo cried in disbelief. “I’m _screwed!_ ”

Kotetsu laughed loudly, clapping the other man on the shoulder. “Get ready to pay up, sucker!”

Ibiki’s expression was serious as he crouched, settling his weight into his legs. “I want you to come at me like you’re trying to kill me, Yūrei - do you understand? Do _not_ hold back.”

She nodded resolutely. “I got it.”

He nodded, raising a hand over his head. “Call it, Anko!”

“On your marks! Get set! GO!”

Yūrei immediately shunshin-ed away in the direction of the river, hiding high in the trees in the thickest branches she could find, her back to the rushing water.

She breathed in deeply, exhaling with a whisper: “ _Ninja Art: Hidden Mist Jutsu!_ ”

The spray over the rocks immediately coalesced into a thick, rolling fog that blanketed the training field, and she saw Ibiki’s large silhouette disappear as he shunshin-ed away as well.

She closed her eyes, focusing, drawing chakra to her inner ears to pick up the smallest sounds below the river’s rumble, sifting through them, until – 

_There._

Ibiki was in a tree twenty meters ahead, slightly below her and to the left. 

His breathing was slow and measured, and _quiet_ , so quiet she almost hadn’t picked it up until she’d just barely caught the steady beat of his heart along with it.

She reached silently into her pouch for a kunai, sidling slowly along a branch to get a clear shot at him.

His head whipped around just as the knife left her hand, and he dodged it easily, launching forward in her direction.

_Fuck!_

Her position given away, she shunshin-ed back to the posts, drawing a kunai and watching for him to emerge from the trees and catch sight of her, waiting until he’d done just that to thicken the mist even more, disappearing from his view even as he vanished from hers.

“I can’t see a fucking thing,” Izumo complained from the edge of the field.

“That’s the point, idiot,” Anko replied.

Yūrei couldn’t see Ibiki anymore, but she could still track him through the mist – he was prowling steadily in her direction, and she leapt to her right, landing soundlessly twenty meters to his left.

With a scant flicker of chakra, she sent a water pellet at Ibiki’s ear from his nine o’clock, leaping behind him as his head turned quickly.

Another pellet stung the back of his neck, and as he whirled around she leapt again, landing at his twelve o’clock now and closing half the distance between them. 

The Mist was thick, heavy, and it muffled but quite didn’t cover his frustrated growl. “Stop playing around goddamnit!”

She laughed silently and slipped the kunai back into the holster.

_I’ll show you playing around._

Flashing through a series of hand-signs, she sank into the ground, moving forward as easily as if the earth were a still pond, and she zeroed in on the big man’s position - 

“ _Earth Style: Headhunter Jutsu!_ ”

Her hands gripped his ankles, and she yanked down sharply even as she flooded her legs with chakra and sprang to the surface, and Ibiki was pulled into the dirt in a blink.

The curse he let out was utterly vicious as he glared at her, and she only laughed once in response before flashing him a wide smile and touching two fingers to her headband, before hurriedly springing back into the trees in the direction of the river.

_Big and strong as he is, that won’t hold him for long..._

Calling on more chakra – she could feel how much she had left, and she knew she’d be cutting it close with what she had planned – she created a few dozen water clones that were held together with only the exact amount of chakra necessary to keep them solid.

Ibiki appeared, mud-streaked and utterly furious as he lashed out with a kunai, following up with a vicious kick when the knife swiped over the ducked head.

The clone exploded into a fall of water as his foot connected with its temple.

_Alright, this is it._

With him surrounded by clones, she called each one toward him in a careful pattern as she began steadily backing up toward the river, and her hands started flashing through the first of the forty-four signs:

_Ox, Monkey, Hare, Rat -_

Closer and closer to the rushing water.

Ibiki was snarling, his face a mask of fury as he destroyed clone after clone after clone, and she could feel his Killing Intent increasing with each splatter of water on the ground.

She moved faster: _Ox, Ram, Rat –_

Finally, he was within range, and she shunshin-ed to a rock in the middle of the rushing water. _– Bird!_

“ _Water Style –Water Dragon Jutsu_!”

The leftover clones and all of the mist disappeared instantly, and the dragon reared from the roiling water’s surface, maw gaping wide as it roared.

Ibiki whirled around, and his jaw dropped in shock even as he brought up his hand to shunshin away but the dragon was already on him, snapping its frothing jaws closed around his chest.

He went under, his big body tossing and turning before being slammed into a nearby tree with the force of a battering ram.

Yūrei release the jutsu, and he gasped for air at the water receded, coughing up what had gone down his throat.

Shunshin-ing directly in front of him, she placed the point of a kunai beneath his scarred chin and tipped it up. “Surrender.”

“Done,” he wheezed, raising a hand to clap her on the shoulder. “Nice job, girlie.”

She holsters the kunai and throws her arms around him with a delighted squeal, and he grunted sharply in pain as he slid down the trunk of the tree to the ground.

“That was totally awesome!” Anko whooped, and the three spectators came barreling forward.

“Fork it over.” Kotetsu held a hand out to Izumo. “Told you the underdog had it.”

“You certainly know how to play to your strengths,” Ibiki said, unzipping his flak vest and putting a hand on his ribs. “That fucking hurt.”

“Don’t tell me she broke more bones again,” Anko laughed.

“Think I cracked a couple of ribs against that tree.” He closed his eyes and tried to breathe a little shallower.

“Can you bring him to the hospital?” Yūrei turned to Anko. “I’m just about out of chakra.”

“Sure thing. Come on, big guy.” The purple haired-kunoichi crouched down, slinging one of Ibiki’s arms across her shoulders, and she shunshin-ed them away in a swirl of leaves.

“So - ” Yūrei slipped her hands in her pockets and turned to Izumo, grinning like a fox. “Do you know enough about me now?”


	8. Memory Lane

Yūrei showed up to the doors of the hospital just as Ibiki was walking out.

“Hey there, girlie.”

“How bad was it?” she asked immediately, looking down at his unzipped flak jacket.

“Three ribs cracked and two bruised to hell. They’re all healed up now, but I’m still supposed to take it easy for a few days.”

“Makes sense.” She rubbed the back of her neck, not meeting his eyes, but with her jaw set.

He could tell that she felt bad for hurting him, but that she was also remembering he had told her to come at him without holding back, to kill, and that was exactly what she’d done.

They walked along, and he heard her stomach growl. “Sounds like you need to get some food in you.”

“Probably not a bad idea. I did burn through almost all of my chakra taking you down.”

“You sound pretty proud of that,” he teased, nudging her.

“Wouldn’t you be, if you were me?”

“Oh, without a doubt,” he answered quickly. “I’m just messing with you.” Scanning, he spotted a rolling cart offering fresh rolls and syrup. “Hmm… that looks promising.”

“Smells good, too.”

Ibiki moved forward to the cart, purchasing three rolls and passing two to Yūrei. “Here, eat these for now and we’ll go to Yakiniku for some protein.”

“You spoil me,” she said, smiling up at him before biting into a roll.

“Taking care of you makes me happy.” He’d learned that much about himself fairly quickly during her first few days at T&I – he just hadn’t expected to fall for her.

They walked along, and she was starting on the second roll when he asked, “So why is it you’re not a jonin?”

She snorted. “Well for one, I wasn’t allowed to test for it in Kiri.”

“You weren’t allow- ? _What_ ?”

“Zabuza fucked that up for me,” she answered with a shrug. “Kisame made it first, then _he_ made it, and I’d finally decided to buckle down and train for the test, and then Zabuza pulled his coup right before I could. Then once everything calmed down I was told in no uncertain terms should I even _consider_ applying, and I quote: ‘if I knew what was good for me’.”

“Because you were close to him.”

“Yep. Kisame was the only reason I didn’t get arrested actually. Although he definitely didn’t do me any favors when he left next, that’s for sure.”

“I’m surprised he didn’t try to take you with him.”

“He did, actually.” She frowned at the memory. “He wasn’t making any sense though – he just showed up in the middle of the night spouting off about a ‘world of truth’ and his place in it, and it was freaking me the hell out. Then the alarms started and he just bolted, right out the back door…. And once I saw ANBU chasing him, I knew that was it – I had to get out too.”

They made it to the restaurant and he let her choose the table, nodding in approval when she moved to the booth they’d shared previously.

Ibiki asked a question that he’d been wondering for a little while. “You didn’t think about trying to find Zabuza when you left?”

Yūrei went silent, staring at the top of the table between them.

He waited, and after a long moment he reached across the space, and she slipped her hand inside his.

“He would’ve taken me with him if he’d wanted me around anymore,” she finally said, her voice barely above a whisper.

And there it was. “… You two were more than best friends, weren’t you?” he asked gently.

“… Yeah.” She sniffled, then reached up with her free hand to swipe at her eyes. “Yeah, we were… and then he just…he just left. Fuck, he never even told me he was _planning_ anything.”

Ibiki kept quiet, rubbing his thumb over the back of her hand in his and counting backwards in his head.

She was twenty-five and had been in Konoha for just under five years, and the Demon had attempted his coup and abandoned his country about a year or so before she'd arrived, which would have made her nineteen at the time that her heart had experienced its first serious break when he'd left her behind.

Then, barely over a year later, Hoshigaki had broken it again, and finally the idiot civilian had shattered it completely - the third time apparently being the charm when it came to hitting the limit on what she could handle emotionally.

Ibiki considered it a wonder that she hadn't shoved a kunai into his ribs and headed for the hills when he'd made his move on her, though honestly he wouldn't have blamed her if she'd tried.

He also considered himself beyond lucky to be sharing a table with her at the moment, much less his bed any of the nights she'd chosen to.

"Can I ask why you haven't tested for jonin here?" He changed the subject in attempt to lift her spirits.

"I don’t know… complacency, I guess? I didn't want to push my luck when I first got here, and then I just didn't feel the need to." She shrugged. "And once I got involved with…”

“That fucking idiot?” he suggested wryly, and he was rewarded with a bark of laughter from Yūrei.

“Yes, him.” She kept smiling and went on, “By then we had two incomes in the house and we were doing alright with my here-and-there missions to not need any more ryo."

 _Complacency, indeed._

All the same, he was considering recommending her for tokubetsu jonin, which would afford her opportunities for higher-paid missions, once she was steadier mentally.

“Where do _you_ think you’re at?” he asked curiously.

Yūrei thought for a moment. “I think I’m probably above the average chunin, but I don’t know…. What do you think?”

“I think you could be a tokujo tomorrow, if I asked the Hokage to promote you this evening.”

Her eyes went wide as she sucked in a breath. “Are you… are you going to?”

“I’m considering it, but I don’t think it’s a good idea just yet.” He held up a hand as she opened her mouth. “Look, you’re still stabilizing, alright? Just because you could be doesn’t mean you _should_ be, and as long as I’m still signing off on your missions, it’s irrelevant anyway.”

“… That’s fair,” she sighed after a moment.

“Don’t get me wrong, girlie – you’re doing fantastic, and I am _very_ proud of you for that. But I don’t want to push our luck, okay? You had a legitimate psychotic break, and that’s not something that gets fixed in a couple of weeks, no matter how good you might feel.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“You’re still doing alright, yeah? No mood swings, no voices?” He gestured to his temple. “All good up here?”

“All good.”

**********

“That bed is getting brought over _today_ ,” Ibiki groaned as he sat up from the futon on the floor of Yūrei’s apartment. “I don’t care whose genin sign up for it – I am _not_ doing this again.” 

Yūrei mumbled to herself as she silenced the alarm, then rolled over and settled her head on his thigh.

“Come on, girlie,” he said, stroking her hair. “Time to get up.”

She threw an arm across his legs and cuddled closer with a whimpered protest, and Ibiki chuckled, threading his fingers through the soft strands at her nape. 

His chest puffed with pride as she sighed happily at his touch.

“Alright,” he whispered, his thumb stroking along her jaw. “Five minutes, but that’s it.”

Fuck him, but he was helpless against her, especially when she murmured in contentment and nuzzled her face into his belly.

Everything else about him was the same – he was still every bit the vicious, calculating interrogator. Every bit the non-hesitating, ruthless fighter. Every bit the same as he’d been – 

Except when it came to her.

Ibiki stroked her for another few minutes, listening to her breathing change as she fell back asleep. 

It didn’t worry him, not anymore, how she affected him. If anything, he knew it had made him better, because now he had a personal reason to make sure he continued to be the best at what he did, rather than just the professional one of keeping the village secure.

“Come on, baby,” he said ten minutes later, brushing her hair back. “Time to get up.”

She yawned, sitting up and rubbing her hands down her face. “Okay, okay….”

**********

Ibiki sat frozen in his chair, staring at the ANBU standing in front of his desk.

He fought to keep his voice level, only just succeeding. "… One more time."

"Hatake and his genin team are enroute from the Land of Waves… accompanied by Zabuza Momochi."

"Willingly." A muscle jumped in his jaw as Ibiki spoke through clenched teeth. "Not as Hatake's prisoner."

"That's what it seems like, boss. Apparently the Demon's trying to defect. He's hurt pretty badly, but not enough to stop him from making a break for it, and he hasn't made any attempts to. They should arrive by sundown."

He nodded stiffly at the masked ninja. "Dismissed."

The ANBU inclined his head respectfully before leaving, and Ibiki’s gloved fingers curled around the edge of his desk, gripping it tighter and tighter, until the wood creaked in protest beneath his hands.

_Don’t move...._

He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply through his nose, holding his breath, feeling his pulse pounding in his temples as his body started to shake with rage.

_Don't move...._

He exhaled slowly, then held his breath again.

_Don't move._

Another slow inhale, holding it until his lungs burned.

 _Do_ not _flip this_ fucking _desk._

Finally, he breathed out, forcing his hands to release their death grip on the wood as he leaned forward and closed his eyes, putting his elbows on his knees and his face in his palms to muffle his growl of frustration.

He would _not_ lose his shit because Yūrei’s old boyfriend was coming to Konoha.

Really, he wouldn't.


	9. Reunited & It Feels So - OH. Oh No. Oh YES.

They brought the Demon into the village under cover of night, chakra-cuffed and with a sack over his head, the massive broadsword sealed into a scroll and tucked away into an inside pocket of Ibiki’s long black coat.

Zabuza hadn’t protested any of the measures taken, and he’d been rewarded with the promise of a hospital visit for his arms, which looked like they might be salvageable thanks to Kakashi’s first aid over the trip back through the Land of Fire.

Ibiki still wanted to take that head of spiky black hair off the man’s thickly muscled shoulders as he followed behind the ANBU that were on each side of the rogue ninja.

“I want the report first, Hatake,” he growled. “I don’t give a fuck how much the chunin at the Mission Room bitch about procedure - you bring it to _me_ , do you understand?”

“You’re more intense than usual,” Kakashi drawled in response. “Good thing my genin aren’t here… but then again, I’m sure you’d get a kick out of menacing a few twelve-year olds.”

Ibiki’s already-frayed nerves threatened to snap, and he clenched his teeth to avoid snarling a reply to the silver-haired shinobi’s baited statement.

He didn’t relax in the slightest when they made it to the hospital, and the two ANBU took up posts on either side of the door to the room as a pair of medic-nin converged on Zabuza and laid their chakra-wreathed hands on the wounds in his arms.

When the medic-nin had finished, the sack went back over Zabuza’s head and he was brought to T&I, still not resisting in the slightest as he was placed in the small cell and the cuffs were removed in favor of the suppression seals around the door.

Ibiki didn’t trust the compliance, not one bit, but he didn’t have enough information to begin an interrogation, and he wanted Inoichi’s assistance on that anyway.

So he merely slammed the door of the cell closed and left the department without a word to his subordinates.

He didn’t dare go around Yūrei, as foul a mood as he was in, and naturally that made it even worse.

And he knew he’d only be able to keep the Demon’s arrival from her for so long, depending on what the Hokage wanted to do with the mercenary, and he refused to let his mind go anywhere near the possibility of the two former Kiri-nin reuniting.

**********

“Something’s not right with you,” Yūrei said cautiously the next afternoon as they met for lunch.

“… Just troublesome prisoners,” he answered after a moment, because that was close enough to the truth.

“Hm.” She dropped his gaze and pulled a ribbon of ramen from the bowl in front of her.

He could tell she wasn’t convinced, and he was mildly impressed because there were only two other people that could actually get a read on him when he was in a mood, and those were Anko and Inoichi.

The latter had gotten into the Demon’s head earlier that afternoon to corroborate Hatake’s report, and Ibiki kept his face neutral as he remembered experiencing the memory of the bridge from Zabuza’s perspective, and then the subsequent questioning of the man himself:

_”Why should we trust you?” Ibiki asked flatly. “You’ve already attempted one coup against your Mizukage, and you’ve been collecting funds for another. Who’s to say you don’t try for one here?”_

_Zabuza met his stare head-on. “Last time I checked, your Hokage wasn’t a maniacal despot intent on running his village into the ground.”_

_“Meaning?”_

_“Meaning Yagura is bleeding Kirigakure to death, and he’s doing it with a smile on his face. That fucking caste system - ” He cut himself off with a snarl, and then continued. “The village has been tearing itself apart for years, and instead of fixing it, he’s encouraging it to continue.”_

_“And you’re the one to fix that, are you?”_

_Zabuza dropped his gaze, and moment passed before he finally shrugged one shoulder. “I thought I was.”_

_“Not anymore, then.”_

_“No, not anymore.”_

Because apparently losing the kid had shaken something human loose within the Swordsman.

Ibiki frowned, stirring the ramen with his chopsticks rather than making any attempt to eat it.

With that kind of opening it would be easy, so easy, to break Zabuza. To shatter his mind beyond repair until the now-subdued Demon became little more than a whimpering shell of a man.

But the Hokage hadn’t passed judgement yet, and Ibiki had a sinking feeling that the verdict would be to grant Zabuza asylum within the Leaf.

He felt weight against his arm, and he glanced down to see Yūrei leaning into him.

“Wish there was something I could do,” she said, and he turned slightly so that he could kiss the top of her head, smiling against her hair when she let out a happy hum, and when he raised his head she moved to sit up straight in her own chair and refocus on her bowl of ramen.

She was so sweet… it was the moments like this that made him want to break that civilian’s legs for fucking her over.

Not to mention the man currently sitting in one of his cells, for being the _first_ in the line of heartbreaks she’d had.

And much as Ibiki loathed the idea, he knew now that if the Hokage did in fact decide to let Zabuza stay, the first fucking thing he would have to do would be to put the two former-Kiri-nin in a room with each other, because he refused to let that reunion happen unsupervised.

**********

Ibiki flipped the heavy wooden desk like it was a cheap folding table.

The resounding crash as it hit the floor was better than any roar he could manage, and he glared at Inoichi as the blonde man stood calmly in the doorway.

"And this would be why you weren't invited to the meeting," was the dry response. "I'm glad we don't share an office anymore."

"I will _not_ -" Ibiki snarled, abruptly cutting himself off as he heard the intake door buzz open and then thud closed - 

"Hey guys!"

\- and the sound of Yūrei's voice as she greeted Shimon and Mozuku.

Inoichi barked a laugh, shaking his head. "Perfect fucking timing."

"Listen you son of a -"

"Ibiki, I picked up a C-Ranked that I need you to..." Her voice trailed off as she ducked past the pony-tailed shinobi and stepped into the office. "... I'll just come back later then, yeah?"

"No, stay," he gritted out as she turned to leave. "You and I need to talk."

"I'll take that as my cue." Inoichi took a step back.

"You stay too."

He raised an eyebrow. "You're not going to do that _now_ , are you?"

"Do what now?" Yūrei's expression turned wary as she looked between the two men. "What's going on?"

Ibiki ignored him and waved a hand at Yūrei. "Come with me."

"Oh hell no." She shook her head and stepped away from the both of them. "Not until you tell me why your office is trashed and why you're throwing off Killing Intent like you want to murder everyone in this building."

_Fucking hell._ He reeled in his KI and spoke more calmly. "You remember that troublesome prisoner I told you about yesterday?"

"Yeah?"

"I need you to talk to him."

"Say _what_?"

"Let's just say you're going to get a better response from him than either of us have so far," Inoichi said quickly. "Don't worry, we'll both be in there with you, and he'll have chakra-cuffs on."

"Ibiki?"

"It'll be alright, I promise."

Not only because he didn't think Zabuza would be a threat to Yūrei, but the fact was that Ibiki was liable to kill the Demon with his bare hands if the man so much as _looked_ the wrong way at her, the way he was feeling at the moment.

She still looked apprehensive, but she nodded, and then followed him as he moved past Inoichi into the hallway.

Ibiki led the way to the interrogation room and motioned for her to step inside. "Don't sit down, I'll be right back."

Collecting Zabuza took only a moment, and he had the rogue ninja by the scruff of the neck as he tossed him unceremoniously into the interrogation room before stepping in and closing the door behind them.

The dark-haired man stumbled forward before regaining his balance, his arms cuffed behind his back, and he snarled as he stood up straight and whirled toward Ibiki.

And then Zabuza caught sight of Yūrei, and the Demon went pale.

Ibiki’s focus was on her – she was standing frozen, not even breathing, with wide eyes and jaw dropped open.

He watched as she finally exhaled and took a slow step, and then another, in Zabuza’s direction, until she was just shy of arm’s length away.

And the man was utterly still, looking down at her as though he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing.

“How - ”

It happened in less than a second – Yūrei took half a step, pivoted sharply on her heel, and her foot slammed squarely into the side of Zabuza’s head.

The Demon hit the floor like a sack of bricks and Inoichi burst out laughing, doubling over and holding his chest as he guffawed.

Ibiki leapt forward and grabbed Yūrei by the collar, yanking her back and putting himself between her and Zabuza as the latter sat up slowly with a dazed expression on his face.

_Good fucking job, girlie._ He wished he could let her do it again, but – 

“You fucking _asshole_!” Yūrei was shouting, and she struggled in Ibiki’s grip, her feet scrabbling against the floor in attempt to get back at Zabuza. “You son of a _fucking_ –”

“Get her out of here,” Ibiki barked, shoving Yūrei at Inoichi, and the blonde man snagged her by the arm and grunted when she began to fight him as well.

“Fucking – calm – calm down! We’ll give you another crack at him later, kid, come on.” And he dragged the furious and cursing Yūrei from the room in something resembling a headlock.

“… I think I deserved that,” Zabuza said as he watched them go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Due to personal reasons I'm putting this story on hiatus. I'm not giving up on it completely, but I need a break for a bit. I hope you enjoyed Zabuza getting TKO'd.
> 
> See you again sometime!


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